


Captive

by FixOrRideDaily



Category: Until Dawn (Video Game)
Genre: Beth’s name is Elizabeth, F/F, F/M, Lesbian Character, Mild Sexual Content, My AU in which Chris and Jess are step-siblings, Not knowing you are in love, Other, Other Ships Not Mentioned in Tags, POV Lesbian Character, Recreational Drug Use, Secret Relationship, Step-siblings au, Trans Character, Transphobia, Underage Drinking
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-11
Updated: 2018-05-22
Packaged: 2018-11-30 21:00:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 10
Words: 46,942
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11471592
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FixOrRideDaily/pseuds/FixOrRideDaily
Summary: It's hard to keep a secret...Even harder if it's not your own.





	1. Caged Bird

**Author's Note:**

  * For [holeybubushka](https://archiveofourown.org/users/holeybubushka/gifts).



> This is a Sath story but warning if you don't like Chrashley then turn around. This is heavy Chrashley. Plot-driving heavy.
> 
> Also this is an interpretation of Josh's actions I don't usually go with but support. Same with Beth. But since they are not MY versions of Josh and Beth please be a little forgiving.
> 
> Also Ashley uses They/Them pronouns. Sorry if that gets confusing. The trans thing is not random and it will be explained eventually.

“What secret about you would be devastating to get out?”

Beth would say that was the moment it started. No surprise it had been her fucking brother’s fault that her life got so incredibly complicated so incredibly quickly.

“You know no one is going to answer that, Josh,” Sam told him matter a factually. She wasn’t wrong. Even this drunk and high they weren’t messed up enough to spill their hearts out, especially to a group notorious for busting balls and airing dirty laundry. Beth’s coming out had stayed secret for maybe half a day for instance. Expecting anything to stay sealed behind these ten pairs of lips was social suicide.

Though it wasn’t something she’d ever wanted to be tested.

“Boo,” Josh moaned collapsing back on the couch next to Chris and Ashley. Once he was sitting Josh held his hand out to curl his fingers in a ‘gimme’ motion. Ashley had a big literally phallic shaped bowl with correct anatomy. Beth assumed anyway. She’d never seen one. Not up close. She had a strong feeling its shape was why whenever Chris took it from one to pass it to the other, his friends cried out;

“Passer’s fee.” It was Ashley this time who almost whispered it into his ear after they slid off the arm to stand behind the sofa, their hands sliding slowly along his shoulders then down passed his chest and back up again. Chris groaned before he moved to take their spot on said arm and playfully blew smoke in their face when they leaned in close to him making them giggle. He smirked like a devil in return. Those two were way too giddy not to be stoned already.

Chris tossed the bowl to Josh once his “fee” had been paid. Beth honestly didn’t understand why this was bad. “Passer’s fee” meant the person in the middle who passed the bowl or joint had to take a hit before handing it off. But she wasn’t the stoner here. Jess laughed an unbelievably sexy, yet still sweet, drunken laugh finding joy in her step-brother’s pain. She wiggled her beanbag chair against the one a basically comatose Mike was in. Watching her warmed Beth more than any brand of alcohol could.

Though Beth was probably the least inebriated person here, besides maybe Sam who was sitting on the floor pressed up next to her with Hannah’s head in her lap. Hannah had always been a light-weight which unlike with Mike surprised no one. Matt was on Hannah’s other side just barely leaning against the cool, brick fireplace. The four of them were sprawled in a weird but mostly comfortable half-pile kind of thing on easily the softest floor in the world.

“Are we still playing?” Matt asked looking over at Emily as it was meant to be her turn. They all hated ‘truth or dare’ as people were never brave enough to do ‘dares’ and ‘truths’ were either far too vague or far too specific. So they played “questions” where they went in a circle and they asked the whole group a question they had to answer then the asker had to answer it. It was a calmer and a far more playable party game because the questions stayed tamer (and were usually much more interesting) since they all had to answer it. It seemed pointless to keep playing though as Mike, Hannah and Jess were gone from this world. Emily, lounging on the recliner in a rare state of casualness, shrugged taking a long drink.

“I think Josh killed it,” she said once she was done. Sam sighed in mock disappointment.

“That’s a bummer,” she whispered, “I had a good one.”

Beth nudged her but not hard enough to jostle Hannah, “Don’t lie. You never have any ‘good ones.’”

Sam looked playfully affronted putting a hand to her chest. She shook her head and looked away with her nose turned to the air. She was ridiculously silly which also made her ridiculously adorable. It was probably why she was Hannah’s best friend, after Beth and Josh that was. It was nice Hannah had someone like that in her life. Beth liked Sam quite a lot. She was cool. She and Hannah were good for each other. Plus Sam had enough in common with Hannah for them to do the things they both liked, enough in common with Beth for them to do the things they both liked and enough in common with each of the twins for them to do the things they all liked together.

She was great to have around.

“She’s just being honest, Sam,” Josh teased through the smoke leaking out of his mouth, “It’s an admirable quality I hear.”

“How would you know? You’ve never told the truth in your whole life, I’ll bet,” Jess laughed by then being the only thing keeping Mike from sliding to the floor.

Which it why he tumbled and was monetarily shook awake when Jess span in her seat clumsily to avoid the ready to tickle, wiggling hands of Josh as he sprang forward. They were both too weighted down by depressants at this point to do much running or jumping around so it was more a contest of who could crawl faster and playfully wrestle hands away better. Matt laughed his loud, genuine laugh and Emily snickered too as Jess made her way onto the empty couch Josh abandoned as he crawled up behind her. After quite a bit of grabbing at her, he successfully managed to pin her body underneath him in a way that looked, that was, far too sexual in Beth’s opinion.

“You can’t attack me in my own home, Josh,” she laughed as she tried (but didn’t actually try) to push off his quick, tricky fingers.

“You sure? I seem to be capable of it.” Clearly so. Why did he get to touch her like that? It wasn’t fair.

“I’m going to go get towels before these two make a whole mess of the room.” Beth nodded after Sam said it and gently helped her shift Hannah into Matt’s lap. She wasn’t asleep but she was drunk enough to be handled without much fight and the worse she did was whine like a child as she was moved over to another head resting spot.

“I’ll come with,” Beth said following Sam. She was less worried about any mess than she was eager to get away from Jess and her brother’s very charged display. There was nothing going on between them. He wouldn’t do anything knowing how Beth felt, but all the frequent flirting and play fighting still hurt. Her brother and sister got everything. Hannah had the kind of best friend Beth only got to dream about. Josh had the kind of relationship with Jess Beth only got to dream about. Jess was Beth’s best friend up until she met Emily, who neatly fit herself into a place Beth had not known she had been pushed out of (Sam would never let anything like that happen with her and Hannah). Oh, well. A best friendship with Jess would’ve been far too difficult to maintain anyway with Beth lusting after her and her basically dry-humping Beth’s brother whenever she was even a little drunk (and sometimes when she wasn’t).

She and Sam wandered the house looking in the closets and some of the first floor rooms silently debating whether to get paper towels or if this could require actual towels. Both of them knew the Riley/Hartley family well enough to know going through this part of the house wouldn’t be an issue. Their stuff was well organized and they would have to seriously go out of their way to be prying.

Once they found the linen closet. Beth pulled down towels to hand to Sam, taking the opportunity to lean up over the other girl’s head mocking her height. Sam poked her in her side making her almost drop everything. They playfully started knocking into one another heading back the way they’d come once they each had an armful. Then they heard a noise that sounded like something knocking loudly against wood. They looked at each other. Chris’ mom and Jess’ dad were out of town for the weekend, hence them partying here. Them being the ten of them. Only the ten of them. They had no pets either.

“Should we check it out?” she asked already moving that way, “Or should we get Jess or Chris?”

“We should probably just look ourselves. There’s no point in worrying them when it could be nothing.” Sam answered as they begun walking that way before the choice was even really made yet. They heard the sound again but somewhat softer this time. Beth nodded as she reached for the knob then opened the door at a slightly slower pace than was normal.

Chris was a second brother to the Washingtons and Sam saw him in much the same way. So one of the last things either wanted was to see him in a context that could be construed as sexual. That wasn’t so easy with him between Ashley’s legs as they clawed at his back, his mouth to their neck and his large hand-

“Ah Chr- mm. Oh. Oh... no!” Ashley had been softly moaning before they noticed the two girls and shoved Chris away, confusing him for half a second or so. Beth was ready to slam the door shut and book it when Chris motioned for her not to with one hand and a gentle “wait.” She considered ignoring him as he was trying to wipe his other hand off on his jeans. She suppressed her gag reflex and could easily sympathize with Sam’s shell-shocked face.

“Chris, please don’t say you want a chance to explain this,” Beth said before he could speak, “Because there is nothing you could say right now that I would believe.”

“I’m not an idiot,” he sounded insulted, “I’m well aware this situation is pretty much self-explanatory.”

“Pretty much?” Beth questioned. Understatement there, buddy. Ashley was breathing heavily still siting on the desk. Chris was too, his arms crossed. Beth hated that she knew why they were out of breath.

“I can not believe you guys,” Sam finally said in a voice that bordered on scolding mother as if it just registered for her, “Why are you fooling around right down the hall from all of your friends?”

“Why are you two opening random doors in my house?” Chris snapped back. Ashley had not moved since the two were discovered. It was weird, they almost matched. Chris in his binder and Ashley in their bra, both pairs of jeans barely still on their hips. They’d been about to- In here?! Gross! This was Mr. Riley’s home office and Chris had a bedroom in this house, where interruptions of this nature were much less likely to occur. Beth had not known he hated his mom’s husband this much.

“You know,” Beth stepped in between a close to arguing Chris and Sam, “Not a big deal. We’re gonna get back to the living room and you two can get back to… this.”

Ashley finally looked over, “No wait, you can’t go!”

“Flattered Ashley, but based on what we, unfortunately, saw and heard, it seems like Chris is at least marginally okay at this so you don’t really need either of us.” Beth waved a hand between herself and Sam while she said it. Why wouldn’t they just let her and Sam leave? Where was Chris’ bad, tension breaking, humor when she actually wanted it?

Chris rolled his eyes, once more looking insulted, “They didn’t mean- You can’t go until you promise not to say anything about this.”

“What even is this, Chris?” Damn, why did Sam have to be so nosy? Beth wanted to leave at a speed that would’ve worried drag racers. Chris looked at Ashley as if he was asking for their permission before he said anything. The two if them stayed that way for a bit. Whatever look they gave him was one of agreement based on his face when he turned back to her and Sam.

“Ashley and I are,” he paused for a long time, “Kinda together.”

“No, really?” Beth deadpanned and Sam hit her arm. They shared an annoyed look at each other.

“We started uh this started not that long ago,” he explained, “And we’ve been keeping it quiet since.”

“Why?” Sam, shut up!

“A lot of reasons,” Ashley said in his place, “My dad would so not be okay with it.”

“Besides that things are still super tense around here with the whole blended family crap.”

“Also neither of us has ever really been with someone before.”

“Then there’s, you know, all the us being transgender stuff.”

Beth was a little impressed by that. It sounded almost rehearsed. The two clearly put a lot of thought (maybe far too much thought) into all this. She figured it was useless to ask if secrecy was their goal, why take off to fool around while all of their friends were there. She was already way more aware of the specifics in this than she would ever want to be though. She really didn’t need to hear confessions of something like they just couldn’t keep their hands off each other any longer.

“Plus we’d just really rather not involve anyone else,” Ashley added after a moment.

“And by anyone else you mean…” It was only half a question from Sam because much like Beth she knew who they had actually meant. 

Chris looked back at Ashley once before together they finished the inquiry, “Josh.”

It was a really good point. Her brother was… unpredictable on this front. 

He was always telling Chris to go for it with Ashley but everyone could see it was a little forced. As if he was trying slightly too hard to be on-board with something he wasn’t. It was hard to judge whether he’d be genuinely happy about the two getting together or if it would cause a wide spread black out in his mind. Put plainly no one was sure whether or not he was hiding some deep fear of being left behind if and when the two of them ever became a them. In the early, giddy part of their relationship that might be something too heavy for either Chris or Ashley to deal with yet.

“We won’t say anything. Promise,” she decided hearing the annoyance in her own voice. She figured it would be better for everyone. Most especially Josh. Their bodies sagged in an obvious relief right after.

Then Sam switched from intrusive mom to intrusive friend in a minute at most, “Yeah I promise too, we won’t tell but one of you better give me plenty to tell later.”

“Yes, fine,” Chris sighed obviously just as done with this conversation as Beth was, “We’ll give you all gory details later. Just go so we can put our clothes back on!”

Sam looked like she was about to point out that if they were putting clothes on and not taking them off she and Beth didn’t need to leave, Beth was having none of that and quickly left knowing Sam would follow if she was heading back. She closed the door as quickly as she could manage. The two started back toward their group of friends the tension between them thick. The last thing Beth wanted to talk about was what just happened, but knowing Sam…

“Oh my god.” She cracked right about when they reached the bathroom door. Beth was not a gossiper. That was one of the traits Sam shared with Hannah. Sam couldn’t gush to her though. She gave Chris and Ashley her word and while Sam loved gossip she would never share anything she was asked to keep a secret. Everything else was fair game. Technically this was fair game too, just only with Beth.

The two leaned on the bathroom door and it was only then Beth realized they’d dropped the towels in their justified shock. She wasn’t going back for them. Not under threat of death. She wouldn’t remotely risk the chance of Chris and Ashley deciding to turn their little ‘sexy rendezvous’ into a ‘hot quickie’ which would mean Beth walking in on something much more graphic.

“I’m just really surprised is all. About Chris actually going for it.” She sounded it. Beth felt herself doing that thing people do where they run their hands through their hair as if that would help them process information. She did it a few times before she rubbed her forehead instead.

“I feel like we can safely assume Ash made the first move.” Beth truly believed what she had said too. Ashley finally getting sick of waiting and pouncing on him instead made a lot more sense. Like her, Sam pulled her ponytail as if the tightness was stopping her thoughts. That was too crazy to handle. 

Then Sam laughed. She just started laughing. Hard. It was so joyful Beth joined in. They laughed for awhile almost sliding down off the bathroom door. They laughed through the awkwardness. Once out of it the situation was a little bit funny. They laughed because after that bit of drama a few moments ago it felt good to laugh. Beth noticed for what felt like the very first time that Sam had a nice laugh.

A stumbling Hannah came into view moments later doing the ‘I have to pee’ dance and trying so hard to hide it but no one could make a ‘bathroom dance’ not look silly and childish. Sam and Beth headed away from the door without making small talk with her. They didn’t even have time with how quickly she rushed through the door. Beth looked over at Sam and hoped she wasn’t as red faced. Maybe they were a bit more drunk than she had thought they were earlier. 

Josh was laying across the bigger couch spooning Jess from behind, which looked a bit too cuddly for Beth’s tastes, and both were asleep. Mike probably knocked out before them. Emily had reclined the easy chair and was also asleep. Matt had settled onto the other beanbag chair and Mike was curled up on his own half leaning against Matt. Matt did not look far away from passing out himself. He smiled leaning his head heavily against the nearest surface.

“Where did you two go?” he asked lazily.

“Don’t worry about.” Matt nodded as if that was an answer then he too was in dreamland.

They were still more awake then everyone here so it wasn’t a surprise no one had the frame of mind to set up the pull out bed. So as the two set to removing the cushions off the smaller couch to yank it out, Hannah wandered back in swaying on her feet a little. She looked at the two, noticing they were still setting the bed up. It was big enough for three, she could join them. Patient was not a word for her and she plopped herself between Matt and Mike somehow instead. She was apparently comfortable enough to sleep. Beth and Sam dropped into the bed as softly as possible when it was ready the only two awake with the exception of Chris and Ashley somewhere, Sam still smiling a little. She liked when she had a secret. 

Even though Beth normally didn’t this one time it felt a bit fun.

\---

Waking the next day Beth looked over to see Chris had snugly fit himself against the front of the couch Josh and Jess shared with a bunch of blankets and pillows whenever he came in. Ashley had somehow manged to squeeze into the mess of bodies that was Matt, Mike and Hannah. Beth wondered if they had started leaned against the armchair and sometime during the night had slid to their side and settled most of their body on Matt ‘free side.’

Sam had snuggled up behind her. That was not a surprise. Sam was a nighttime cuddlier. Whoever was going to be sleeping near her better be prepared for her to wrap herself all around them. Her arms, legs and head were magnets to the person beside her. Her grip even while unconscious was iron tight and she slept like she was in a coma so getting her off was a fight. Beth was pretty much stuck.

“Hey,” a voice called and Beth leaned up as much as she could from Sam’s crushing arms. It was firm but also comforting. She met eyes with Matt who attempted a wave her direction. He was in much the same boat as her. With Ashley on one half of his body, Hannah on the other and Mike keeping them all pinned there. Neither of them were going anywhere yet. Matt was smiling as he shook his head and Hannah stirred squinting her eyes drifting into almost awake but not quite and did not move off Matt.

“Morning, Beth,” he said still drowsy. 

“Morning, Matt,” she returned.

“Where did you and Sam disappear to last night?” he asked very innocently. She had hoped everyone was too drunk to remember them leaving but Matt had been right next to them so maybe that was why. There was feminine groaning that was definitely Hannah being annoyed by his deep rumbling voice

“To get towels in case Jess and Josh made a mess,” Beth answered because it was the truth then Matt nodded because that was perfectly logical. The nodding soon stopped though as new voice joined in.

“I resent that statement,” it moaned. So it was Josh, “But pass one over here, sis. I’m sweating like a sinner in church and Jess is too so it’s pretty sticky on this couch and not in the good way… well, yet.”

Beth looked over, ignoring how his innuendo stoked the fire in her chest. Josh was asking for a towel. A towel she didn’t have. She had dropped them when she saw- No, not thinking about that. Beth was a skilled liar though. It was a Washington trait she had honed. Maybe better than her father and brother.

“I’d have to run and get them. We piled them in the bathroom since you were all asleep by then.”

“No you didn’t. They weren’t there when I went in.” Fuck, why did Hannah have to be a drinker that actually remembered the night before? Probably because she’d get tired before she drank enough to black out. She shouldn’t worry though losing towels was innocent. She glanced at Ashley then at Chris.

“I guess we must have dropped them or something.” Drunkenness could explain almost anything away. Besides Emily’s arm had stretched up, Matt was shaking Ashley awake, Hannah reluctantly rolled Mike off to stand and Josh was sitting up behind Jess. The topic would soon be moving on to food, clean-up and rides home.

Hannah looked over at her but was gone soon after heading presumably to clean her face.


	2. Cellmate

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She's not in it alone, now is that good or bad?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Don't except all chapters out this close together, especially cause I got work to do over the next few weeks.

Having them around was weird. Chris, Sam and Ashley were almost fixtures at the Washington manor. More so than the other four were that was. Sam and Chris has practically lived there since they were all still children. Ashley started showing up whenever Chris did not long after he met them. Chris cited it was because Josh grew good weed and Ashley would enjoy getting high with the two them which was bullshit as everyone knew he did it because he had a crush on them. There were less days in the week the three of them weren’t there than days of week they were.

So it was weird. True most times Beth hung out with Sam and Hannah while Chris and Ashley hung out with Josh. There were a few times the six of them would gather together to do one thing though. Like watch a movie or pig out on pizza talking about nothing in particular or even play board games, which they could never do with any of the others as they either thought it was lame (Emily and Mike) or didn’t get the rules (Jess and Matt).

Or hang out at the pool cause it was hot out. The way they were doing today. It had been Hannah’s suggestion and once Josh agreed it was settled. Trying to deter either her brother or her sister was hard. Trying to rein them both in was harder than trying to reign in actual horses and bulls. Sam and Ashley had quickly agreed as well. So they were going swimming. All of them save Ashley had known one another long enough to not be ashamed of their bodies with each other (even Chris) and their comfort made Ashley not really worry about it either. 

Sam and Hannah booked it as soon as the pool was in sight.

“I get first dive off the high board.” Hannah said it like it was not a request but a factual statement.

“Not if I get to it first.” Sam was probably the only person alive who could get away with challenging Hannah on anything. Beth thinks it was because Hannah was afraid she would lose Sam if she fought her too much on anything. That was one of the reasons Sam was good for Hannah. How she gave her something Beth couldn’t. Beth had a lot to thank Sam for. Hannah ran after Sam and caught up with her seconds later. Sam was faster but Hannah had much longer legs. Sam was a tiny cute thing. She was a lot like the spunky puppy Hannah used to have. Before Beth demanded they get rid of it as she was the one stuck taking care of it not Hannah.

Hannah got there first and was on her way up already by the time the four of them made it to the pool.

“I’m coming for ya, Han,” Sam called as she quickly followed after her laughing the whole time they were climbing. They had basically thrown their stuff onto a pool chair. Beth set to straightening their stuff out before she dropped her bag next to it and started undressing to get into the water. She heard a series of loud splashes when her shirt was over her face. When she could see again she saw Chris had made himself comfortable in the chair next to hers. Chris never went into the pool. Ever. For a myriad of reasons. He’d claim just being next to the water was cooling him off. He still tried to be social with the rest of them. He usually remained on his phone the whole time looking up to laugh with or at them or call something to them. 

“Josh, get off,” Ashley yelled. Beth looked to the pool. He had his arms around them, spinning around. Beth guessed Josh did what he always did, picked them up and dropped into the pool still holding them. It was his favorite thing to do while in the water. Hannah and Sam had changed their race to swimming across the pool launching themselves on the edge just like professionals did albeit much more clumsy. It was… nice. Very sweet. So much so that Beth didn’t want to watch them playing around together anymore and had turned to talk to Chris again instead. He had a look she recognized as it was one she had made a lot, usually at the same target he was aiming his at. Beth signed, tossing her shirt at his face and he turned her way after pulling it off.

“Don’t get like that,” she scolded, “Ashley likes you, not him. Or I assume they do considering your ‘show’ in your step-dad’s office.” He turned dark red. “It’s better not to get jealous and possessive.”

“Yeah, I could say the same to you,” he mumbled. Her heart stopped. He- he knew. Knew about Jess! But then his eyes drifted to the pool steps where Sam and Hannah had climbed up to take a short breath leaning on each other for support, having wasted so much of their energy already. Oh, Chris was being his absurd self. Beth was not even a little jealous of Sam taking Hannah’s attention away from her.

On the upside he did relax his face and turn his gaze to his phone so he’d at least taken her advice on Josh and Ashley. Beth rolled her eyes as she walked away from him to sit by the pool with her feet in the water to catch some sun. It was always relaxing and at times really fun to spend time on hot days at her family pool. Beth never had an issue with it. The pool was usually only awkward when all ten of them were there. Or really just awkward for Beth having to look at Jess. In a bikini. Wet. Skin glowing. Beth groaned and put her sunglasses on. Of course her mind went there. She’d swear she got more gay whenever she even just thought about Jess.

Beth had barely begun to enjoy the sun when it happened.

She heard a sudden loud splash of water to her side and got a little wet. She turned that way to see Ashley climbing as fast as they could out of the pool and sprinting towards Chris soaking wet. He was not nearly quick enough to get to his feet and run away. Ashley threw their arms around his neck and basically slammed him back against the chair. Josh laughed as they held him there by his shoulders. They were also nuzzling their face up against his in an attempt to get him more wet with their hair. 

There was a time that would not have been awkward because they all did it. It was almost a game they played to run up to Chris when he least expected it and soak him. There was nothing to it, it was just a silly thing. Given recently acquired knowledge though it was hard to look at. Not without seeing it in a much less innocent light anyway. Had the two of them always looked a second away from tearing the clothes off one another? Had Beth just never noticed that? Either way she couldn’t not see it anymore.

“Beth!” She was splashed with water when her sister called her name, “Get in the water. Or we’ll have to pull you in.”

“Don’t you dare.” She was too late both she and Josh had grabbed her feet and were yanking her in. She was stronger but they had numbers and gravity on their side. Soon she slipped into the water and lost her sunglasses as she went under. She flailed her way back to the surface and tried glaring at her siblings through her coughing. They were laughing as they swam away from her rage. She didn’t want to play their immature game. She’d been uncomfortable. They’d made her uncomfortable and annoyed. Sam swum up next to her with a sympathetic look. She stood to look passed her shoulder at something. From the impish smile on her face Beth could tell what she was looking at but she was not going to turn around to confirm it. The whole thing was unsettling enough as is.

Sam pulled herself onto the edge of the pool and hopped out to sit there. Her eyes had shifted back to Beth’s face and while she was still smiling Beth felt like the other girl could feel why this unnerved her. Sam motioned towards the house with her head. Beth nodded as she slid out of the water as well and they got to their feet to dry off before heading inside.

“Whoa,” Josh said splashing water their way as they walked by, missing everything but their bare feet, “Where are you two losers going?”

“Back to the house,” Beth explained jerking her thumb that way.

“What?” Josh whined in a high pitched voice.

“It’s that big thing across the garden that all our stuff is in.”

Before Josh said anything else Hannah had swum over to the edge to look up at them, “Sam, why are you leaving? Aren’t you having fun?”

“Of course I am, Hannah,” Sam reassured her, “Beth and I were just heading in to grab her speakers so we can plug in her phone and play some music.”

Her face lit up. “Ooh! Let me come. We’ll get my set instead. It’s way bigger than Beth’s and Josh’s.”

Beth fumed. Their parents had bought some fancy three speaker set last Christmas. Beth hadn’t even bothered to wait until her brother and sister picked. Hannah always got first dibs followed by Josh. Beth grabbed the smallest one of the bunch and headed to her room with a soft ‘thank you.’ She didn’t even have the privilege of Hannah’s ‘sloppy seconds,’ let alone the first choice in anything.

“I think mine will be fine, Hannah.” Beth tried not to snap at her. She hadn’t meant it in a gloating way. She never did. She was just wholly unaware of the giant ‘favorite child’ crown she’d been granted since the three of them could all walk and talk. Beth couldn’t for the life of her understand how the hell Josh managed to claim the very far back second place when she was Hannah’s twin!

“Yeah, plus we’re already dried off and ready,” Sam added sounding much friendlier than Beth had.

“Well, hurry back,” she called before Josh sneaked in to pick her up and drop them both into the water behind him. She hoped Hannah found that fun or they were in for an hour of ‘Aw, it’s okay, Han.’

They didn’t even make it through the kitchen before Sam started in on it, sporting a suggestive smile.

“Did you see them?” she asked, “They’re basically making out.”

Sam laughed but Beth didn’t. This whole thing made her uneasy. She didn’t like knowing it, she didn’t like her brother not knowing it and she really, really didn’t like seeing it. She couldn’t imagine how on earth Sam was so okay with what was going on. Excited even! Probably because she was a romantic much like Hannah, who saw the world through her massive rose-tinted glasses. Sam’s own set weren’t nearly as rosey but were still far too misted with pink than Beth approved of.

“Yeah, I saw them,” Beth bit, “Trust me, I saw them.”

Her brow knit together as Beth sat on the counter with a sign. That wasn’t fair. This wasn’t Sam’s fault.

“I just feel like they are rubbing it in his face and he doesn’t even know,” Beth confessed. There was nothing more important to Beth than Hannah and Josh. But Josh’s friends would know what was better for their dynamic than she would right? And who knew? Chris and Ashley could be a flame that burned high and hot only to fizzle out quicker than it ignited. Was possibly hurting Josh worth it if that turned out to be the case? It was just they didn’t seem to care all that much about hurting their ‘best friend’ despite claiming him the cause behind their silence.

“It’s hard,” Sam said sitting on the stool that was right by Beth’s legs, “To feel strongly about someone and worry that maybe doing anything about it would hurt someone else you love.”

“Yeah, I guess,” Beth agreed but the disbelief she felt must have shown through her voice.

“Really Beth,” Sam pushed looking up at her with a hand on her bare leg just barely above her knee. Somehow that touch felt almost burning but not in a way that made Beth want to pull away. Sam had weirdly calloused hands. The roughness was a huge contrast to the smallness. She wondered whether she had known that before this moment. Not unlike her laugh the other night, sometimes things about Sam seemed strangely brand new. At least strange for someone who’d known her as long as Beth had.

“They might look happy and yeah, they probably are,” Sam sounded like she understood it a lot better than Beth did. That wasn’t a surprise she had an amazing capacity for empathy, “But it’s eating them up on the inside. They want to tell him. They don’t like him not knowing anymore than you. They aren’t keeping quiet to spite him. They’re doing it because they’re justifiably afraid that it would crush him.”

‘And it might.’ Beth hated that it was the truth. From the way Sam stared at her she knew that Beth knew that. She couldn’t be sure about Ashley but she knew it was true for Chris. Chris and Josh were blood brothers. Literally they’d cut their hands and everything. The idiots had to be taken to the ER.

“And can you really blame them?” she went on leaning more on the counter which brought her closer to Beth. Leaning only a little towards her brought the two almost face to face. They were maybe four inches apart. Sam’s breath warmed her lips. Had her eyes always been sprinkled with auburn flakes?

“They’re only human,” Sam said finishing her thought, “I mean your willpower is only so strong and sometimes giving in feels inevitable. They spend a lot of time together. It’s cliche but everyone knows the more you try and force yourself into not wanting something the more you’ll want it. And all that tension has been building between them for so long it probably got to the point where they couldn’t-”

She had been looking right into Beth’s eyes when she stopped. Her gaze was intense with deep craving. It felt like some kind of gravitational pull was keeping their faces close. She wasn’t sure if it felt this way for Sam but Beth felt like it would take the entire force of the universe to separate the two of them even by the smallest amount. To bring them just a tiny bit closer however…

Beth was partially right as only half of her universe was needed to pull her back. “Oh! You scared me!” 

“Sorry, Hannah,” Sam was looking towards the face identical to Beth’s at the door and she was heading that way leaving a trail of thick energy behind her. Beth leaned back until her head was against the cabinets behind her. She felt like she needed to submerge herself into the pool as it was so much hotter.

“What’s up?” Sam continued. As Hannah closed the door to not let the cold air out, she looked from one to the other and her face scrunched up in confusion.

“Where are the speakers?” she asked. Beth and Sam both froze. She was right they should have easily been back with them by this time. Hannah was gullible not stupid. She could believe that they were going to get the speakers but she knew it shouldn’t be taking this long for them to get to Beth’s room.

“Couldn’t find ‘em,” Beth finally said. It sounded so very stupid. Why would they be sitting around in the kitchen if they couldn’t find her speakers. The more logical thought process was-

“Why didn’t you just go get mine then?” Again naive and gullible, but not stupid.

“We wanted to ask you first.” Honestly Sam’s lie was worse. Hannah had specifically offered for them to use her speakers instead. What would make them think she wouldn’t be okay with them grabbing her set if they couldn’t find Beth’s?

“Your speakers are big,” Beth said it as soon as it entered her mind. Any pauses could make it look like they were lying, which they were. They were lying to Hannah for the sake of stupid Chris and Ashley who were less competent at hiding their relationship themselves. At least Beth and Sam were trying to!

“Yeah,” Sam added, “We wanted to ask you first because we need Chris to help since he’s probably much less wet than Josh is. We didn’t want to bring him up to your room without permission.”

“Okay,” she stretched the word out, “Well, Chris left.”

“He did?” Beth asked confused, hopping off the counter.

“Yeah, Ashley’s dad wanted them home soon so Chris offered them a ride,” she explained. Beth rolled her eyes. After their little display outside who would believe that? Well, Hannah would and apparently Josh but she chalked that up to either denial or his belief both were too meek to pursue one another because all of their friends thought that. It could also be again that they had just always been like this. Beth had never really payed attention to them that much.

“Oh, well should we still bring the speakers out?” Sam said with a snicker and glance at Beth having caught onto the same thing as she did, “Cause we’ll run and get them.”

“I thought they were too heavy.”

“Right,” Beth said before Sam blew this, “We’ll just get Josh’s then. He’ll just have to deal with it.”

“Speaking off, you better head back out there or the numskull will probably drown himself.” Sam was already pulling Beth away while she said it. She probably needed time to get out her cute excitement about the ‘scandalous’ relationship. Something which Hannah, who was as nosy as Sam was, was not allowed to see. She would pick up on her best friend’s red faced, snorting laughter if they were alone.

It was longer than expected before the kitchen door clicked shut.

\---

It was like that for a little while. The six of them (or the ten of them) hanging out together. Apparently every other member of their little group had decided to spend most their time together rather than apart. Beth would skip out but she loved hanging out with the gang. She didn’t like many people (in fact there was one member of this group she wasn’t so crazy about either but that wasn’t really Mike’s fault so much as it was Hannah’s). The point being she loved spending time with this small group of people who she actually liked and it was the only social interaction she ever got outside of Josh and Hannah. They all knew that too. Her skipping out would look weird and stand out. Bringing attention to herself was not the best plan. She had to act normal lest she being exposed as a liar.

This also led to Beth having to see more of the traitors Chris and Ashley making small yet significant actions regarding the other. Once more though maybe she’d just never seen the way Chris’ eyes raked along Ashley’s body whenever they stood up or moved away from him for any reason. Maybe she’d just been totally ignorant to Ashley’s hand when it fell to his leg and then they slid their fingers under his knee in a way that was very sensual. The way they found any excuse to sit next to him to practically press their body against his body no matter how much sitting room was on their other side. How he stretched his arm on the back of the couch and they eventually snuggled their head against it and if not the way his fingers would playfully twist into their hair. She must’ve just never payed enough attention to them because no one else seemed to find any interest in this behavior when it happened. Well no…

One person did.

They were down in Josh’s lair. To their parents Josh had claimed the noise from both the girls’ rooms down the hall made his room intolerable for him to have company. That’s why he’d set up a place in basement using two rooms side by side for him and his friends to hang out in peace. He actually grew weed down there. He did have a lounging area but the room behind it housed a weed garden. He was lucky their parents didn’t come down enough to notice. Amazingly the whole group had managed to squeeze down there for a movie. They had a big fancy cinema room, but as usual Josh got his way when he insisted they couldn’t watch the Refer Madness musical if no one was getting high while they did so. They might not have had to if Chris, Ashley, Emily and Jess did not immediately agree. The first three were just as eager to get high as Josh was. But the latter had probably done so because it was what Josh wanted to do. So they were packed into the room.

Beth was coming back into the room after ordering pizza to see Emily in Josh’s recliner. She always grabbed the recliner when they got together no matter whose place they were at. She was smart enough to know if partying started soon people would eventually pass out. Recliners were great for sleeping and she knew that. Emily always thought ahead. Josh sat on the larger couch, Jess snugged up between him and Mike. Matt was at the mini-fridge getting a few beers. Just for a little buzz, not to get drunk.

Sam and Hannah had claimed the small couch. Hannah was pouting an exaggerated pout and Beth could overhear Sam talking to her. ‘I’m sure he didn’t do it on purpose, honey. He was probably just excited about the movie and smoking so he forgot. I’m sure he will remember to let you sit by Mike next time.’ Of course Hannah was pouting about how Josh had let Jess take the seat by him meaning she could not sit by Mike. Sam found her crush as silly as Beth did but she had a heart big enough to attempt seeing her side of it. Like she could for Chris and Ashley.

Speaking of Chris was sitting on her brother’s other side and Ashley was sitting on the couch arm as they often did. The one on Chris’ side of the couch. As Josh fiddled with the TV remote Chris passed joints around to anyone who wanted one. Except for two. Two he put into his own mouth. Two he lit together looking directly into Ashley’s eyes as he did before he passed one of the two over to them. He blew smoke out very slowly afterward. He was clearly trying to draw their attention to his mouth. They gave him a look Beth wasn’t comfortable seeing. So, yeah that happened. 

“Oh, I think I forgot to ask you to order me a vegan pie,” Sam said stopping Hannah mid-sentence it seemed before hopping up and meeting Beth over by the door. Beth hadn’t forgotten to get her one though as they always needed a vegan pie when Sam was over. Just like they needed one without cheese for Chris. Hannah looked at her confused and a little huffy her listening ear had taken off on her.

“We should do it out in the hall,” she continued walking right up to Beth. As predicted Hannah made a face as she stood up to follow them when she clearly did not want to. Josh was starting the movie and Hannah loved musicals, even the weird ones. She even liked Sweeney Todd and Avenue Q. The music part of it seemed to outweigh the other content in the show. 

“It’s okay Han,” Sam said with a pat on her shoulder, “Beth and I can go order it. I know how much you love musicals. Go ahead and enjoy,”

Hannah looked a little sad. Beth knew she’d feel like such a loser going to sit by herself on the couch even though Sam would be joining her in just a minute. She probably still felt bad about the Mike thing and did not want to be alone. Beth could see it and apparently so could Sam. “Hey Matt, why don’t you take my seat while I am gone. There’s room enough for you. The love-seat isn’t too small.”

“Alright.” Matt perked up and immediately went to sit in the free spot next to Hannah. He smiled up at her as he waited for her to sit with him. Beth wondered if maybe Sam was trying to do him a favor as much as she was Hannah. “I got a beer for us each if you want, Han” 

“It’s nice of you to try and cheer me up, Sam,” Hannah whispered with a smile before she took the beer Matt offered and fit herself in the space next to him. She obviously thought Sam had done it because she was sad about Mike. She might have in part. Sam’s face as Hannah turned toward the screen and she practically dragged Beth out into the hall shutting the door loudly after she did, told Beth why Sam really wanted to be alone with her. She had her ‘ooh la la’ face on as soon as she turned to look at Beth.

“Okay those two either enjoy risking things or are having amazing sex. Those looks they keep giving each other and touches and just nuhahh. I mean they’ve always been super touchy but nothing like that.”

Sam kept her voice quiet but her excitement still shown through once more wiggling like a little puppy. At least she had given Beth the answer to why Chris and Ashley’s comfort didn’t bother anyone else. She wondered still why she had never picked up on it before? It must’ve been a pretty obvious and regular thing since she was the only one who was even a little thrown off about it. How did she miss it?

“Josh!” The far too giddy cry of Jess broke through the thick wood of the door. She fought not to let her mind wander to what he might have said (or done) to her to cause that kind of response. If not for his love for his sister Josh could easily get her to fall into his bed. The fire in her chest that always burned for Jess informed her of how she never noticed Chris and Ashley before.

“And oh the joint thing. I didn’t think there was any scenario that could make Chris look sexy.”

“Eww, Sam.” ‘Chris’ and ‘sexy’ put together like that almost broke Beth’s brain.

“Sorry, sorry,” Sam half-apologized, “But all I’m saying is I don’t even play for that team and it got me a little bit worked up.”

Ugh. Wait what?!

“Not on that team?” Beth asked, there were not too many ways to take that and the most obvious was the classic one. She guessed she had taken that to the right place because Sam’s eyes bugged out and her mouth dropped open. Her cute little round face shined red. This was something. A big something.

“Sam,” Beth continued her voice was somewhere between shock and giggly, “Are you- are you gay?”

Sam still wiggled but it had become anxious. She was looking around and biting her lip and Beth knew she was right. She felt really bad though because Sam had not chosen to come out. She had blurted it out because she had not been thinking during her explosion of joy from getting to gossip with someone. So Beth did something she only ever did with Hannah. She grabbed Sam’s shoulders and moved her head in a way that made Sam look at her. Once she had Sam’s attention Beth smiled.

“Don’t worry,” she said reaching a hand up to pet her hair and brush it from her face. She moved her other hand onto Sam’s face and very gently stroked it with her thumb but only because she had not pulled away so Beth knew it was okay. She continued to brush her hand through her hair and it looked like Sam might start crying as her face turned even more red, “This happened but it’s okay. You’re okay and you’re going to keep being okay. You can still go forward because nothing is different. It's all okay. Alright?”

Sam nodded and looked so very vulnerable. She knew that wasn’t true just like Hannah always knew it wasn’t true. But it was what she needed to hear. She didn’t have to process it either here in this place or here in this moment. She could unpack it later. It did not have to happen. Not yet. She could pause this.

Then Sam kind of smiled grabbing the hand that was on her face as she stepped back, “Thanks.”

“Us gays have to stick together.” Sam laughed when Beth said it. She looked at their clasped hands.

“Listen, Beth-” The door behind her opened and Josh’s head popped out. Beth and Sam dropped hands the second they saw him. He had been smiling his dopey smile, but his face dropped into suspicious as he stepped out and leaned against the door frame. He was quiet a second and as he put his joint into his mouth for a long drag, his eyebrows tilted down. He pulled it from his mouth and blew his smoke into the air his eyes shifting from one to the other slowly. Then his face settled into an annoyed look.

“If you guys are done can you head back in here?” he asked, “Hannah is all antsy and keeps looking at the door. It’s distracting and that’s really killing my high.”

“Yeah, sure,” Sam said quickly and walked passed him into the room. Josh gave Beth a strange look before he turned to follow her. Beth went after them. Sam had stopped to lean on the couch a moment looking deep in thought. Josh playfully bumped her shoulder as he walked passed and then dropped back down between Jess and Chris. The latter of whom basically had Ashley in his lap by that point. Beth ignored that because Sam was more important. She had smiled after Josh bumped her.

Beth walked up to her. With a hand on that same shoulder led her to the only place there was left to sit. The just big enough for two indoor hammock Josh had in the far corner. It gave them the worse view of the TV because of the way it span gently even if it wasn’t being pushed and always tilted back slightly. She was sinking down seemingly not remotely looking at the screen as she did. Beth situated herself at her level. She had a feeling Sam had too much on her mind to really care about the movie. Well if there was one thing Beth could do, it was be there for someone.

Right then that someone was Sam.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Confession: I love Chris' implication of oral sex with the joint thing.


	3. Good Behavior

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Maybe if she's good she can lessen her sentence.

Beth had known Chris for many years so she should’ve guessed that at some point he would absolutely take advantage of her knowing about his trysts with Ashley. Honestly she was a little bit surprised that it hadn’t happened sooner.

“Come on, Beth,” he begged, literally begged with hand clasped together as if praying, sitting on her desk chair. Chris kept looking through her doorway to make sure Josh wasn’t coming down the hall. Then he would turn his puppy dog eyes on her again with his full lips in a bit of a pout. He had pretty eyes that were hard to say no to. She’d resist those baby blues though. She’d agreed to keep his secret, and even then only in the wake of trauma, not be the go-to excuse for sneaking around Josh.

“Please.” Ashley liked this guy? How? He sounded like a child half the time. “They really want to go.”

“So then take them,” Beth barked, “Why do you need me?”

“Because Josh loves movies,” he argued, “If he knows we’re going, and he will find out we’re going, then he’s going to want to come.”

Beth leaned back arms crossed. Josh would find out. He would pester it out of them. Her silver-tongue snake of a brother was good at convincing people to tell him whatever it was that he wanted to know. Chris was not a strong willed man, he would crack. A strong desire to continue to ew with Ashley must have been the only thing that kept him quiet on the topic at all.

“And even if he doesn’t find out,” Chris continued, “Then he’ll bug us all week about what we want to do this weekend, where do we what to go, do we wanna stay in and get messed up and then we’re both going to have to tell him no.”

“Tell him you’re studying,” Beth argued, “You two do that together all the time.”

“It’s the beginning of the summer. Even me and Ashley wouldn’t start semester prep work this early. And on a Friday night? Do you think Josh doesn’t know us well enough to guess that’s bullshit.”

‘He apparently doesn’t seem to know you well enough to know you’re fucking!’ is what she wanted to say to him. Out loud though she said, “Then just say you’re busy!”

“If we both tell him we’re busy while not telling him with what he’ll know we’re probably out together without him,” Chris was whining at this point, “That’s gonna be so hard to deal with. He’ll think we’re mad at him or ditching him. You know how paranoid he gets.”

Fuck Chris for pulling that card on her! Fuck Chris for being right all the goddamn time! You know, just fuck Chris in general!

Because Josh would find out, in one way or another that the two were at least somewhere without him. Which his paranoia would interpret as them avoiding him which would then translate into him pressing them in a million ways why they had done it. He would not let it go. Josh never let anything go, ever. That was not the way she wanted Josh to find out about his best friends hooking up. She still couldn’t be sure he’d be okay with it at all. Him figuring it out that way would only make it worse if he wasn’t.

“What would I even tell him, Chris?” She was not done trying to get out of this, “We don’t exactly go for weekly brunch or anything.”

“Tell him we’re doing something that sounds like we would do together but also sounds boring so he won’t want to come.”

“Oh yeah, thanks, Chris, that was really helpful.”

He said nothing once more straining his neck for any sign of Josh, as if he’d take any less than twenty minutes on a buyer, especially one he wanted to get into his bed. Beth would fight this. She would not let him win her over. Whenever this got out it would be bad enough for Josh to find out that Beth knew. She couldn’t even imagine his heartbreak if she had actually helped hide it from him.

He looked back at her with a look on his face very much like one Hannah would make. He was kind of a blend of her siblings. She’d never figured out if that was good or bad. Maybe it was both.

“I just want to take them out on a real date.”

Chris sounded so sad. The way they grabbed at each other and the looks they shot back and forth were (or should’ve been anyway) a dead giveaway the two of them were having sex. Seeing and hearing him in that moment though, it wasn’t hard to tell this had not been something born exclusively out of lust. Chris really liked and really cared about Ashley. She presumed they felt the same way about him. If not they wouldn’t want to go on said date as badly as Chris insisted they did. The two of them were happy. Beth wasn’t sure she’d ever seen Chris so happy. Beside that she couldn’t blame him too much either. She understood what it was like to want something, to want someone, for so long it got to the point where is seemed to physically hurt. The risk of losing it was probably terrifying. Worst of all this was Beth knew, as in for a fact knew, he would do the same if it was her. Chris… he was that kind of guy. That must be the reason Ashley liked him so much.

“I’ll think of something,” she finally mumbled. If Chris was a huger he probably would’ve sprang up towards her and crushed her in his large arms. He looked like he might do it anyway. Instead he half ran out of her room like an excitable child with his phone in hand, probably already texting Ashley to confirm their date. She’d be happier for him had a terrible rock of doubt not dropped into her stomach.

\---

“You’re a mess,” Beth said moving closer to Sam, flicking her fingers at her face to sprinkle it with brown dots. Sam gently smacked her face back to make it match hers. They had not planned to hang out that day until Sam remembered she had to pick up her phone charger and they figured they’d do something together since she was there anyway. After all Sam was her friend as well, not just Hannah’s. They had things in common. This thing wasn’t something Beth would ever admit to enjoying however.

Her mom and Hannah had invited her to come on their shopping trip, but Beth refused. She did not want to spend a whole afternoon listening to her mother complimenting Hannah on every single outfit she tried on and then struggling to do the same whenever Beth tried on anything. Not to say that their mother didn’t think she was beautiful (she had the same face and body as Hannah). They just had very different tastes. She wished she could say she was just her father’s daughter. But she wasn’t that either. She was nothing like him. She was nothing like any of them. No that wasn’t true she was like Josh and Hannah to a point but they had much more in common with each other than they did with her. It was easy to tell Josh and Hannah were siblings within seconds of meeting them. Beth thinks people could only tell with her because she shared her older sister’s face. Heh. Older sister. Beth was so unoriginal she was just a knock-off of the actual Washington daughter. No wonder she had ended up on the very bottom of their family’s totem pole. Who wants the cheap copy of something they already had?

“A messy kitchen makes for a marvelous meal,” Sam answered rolling the mixture into balls with her fingers to coat it with the raw cocoa powder. She saw Sam lick some stray dough off of her wrist and then wipe it on her shirt. She clearly thought she’d been sneaky by the look on her face but even if she had been the trace of brown on her lip would have been proof she’d done it. Beth was basically thrilled when she found out Sam also loved to bake and due to her being vegan knew a bunch of recipes Beth had never tried. All their friends knew she was good at making desserts. She was always bothered by someone to make something for somebody’s birthday or a holiday. But Sam might be the only person who knew Beth actually had fun doing it.

“Is that so?” Beth asked giving a sideways glance and feeling a charming smirk on her lips. Sam smiled back coyly before she averted her eyes. Beth moved closer to her snagging a towel and gently hitting Sam’s mouth with it when she got close. Sam snatched it from her and cleaned herself before she went back to rolling dough. Then Beth joined her to start rolling her own dough into more perfect balls than Sam was. She was happy to know Sam was a little bit clumsy.

“Well, I mean that’s what my baking teacher said to me whenever I tried to clean up my station in the middle of making something.”

“You would do that,” she teased. She smiled looking at the dough.

Mom used to bake cookies with them many years ago. Not really sure why she did it she placed her finished rum ball it on her mouth. She felt the chocolate syrup settle on her lips and drip down her chin and cheek. She didn’t really care all that much though. She leaned back and tossed it up high into the air with just her tongue and a hard out breath. She extended her tongue out of her mouth and managed to catch it when it came back down. There were some stray dots of sauce but the area had mostly survived. She and Josh used to compete at doing stupid tricks all the time when they were kids. Maybe that was the reason she did it.

Beth licked the sides of her mouth and her thumb to wipe each of her lips in turn and finally her chin. She sucked the chocolate off when she was done. She was always better at catching things in her mouth than Josh could hope to be. When she looked back at Sam her eyes were fixed on her. Her latest dough ball was limply in her hand as if she’d forgotten what she was doing.

“What?” Beth asked. She was a little put off by the stare Sam was giving her. Her gaze bounced from her eyes to her mouth quickly. Then she licked her own lips and went back to working.

“That was really cool,” Sam said. There was an extra rasp in her voice, making it even more appealing.

“Thanks,” Beth muttered as they got back to work. They rolled their balls in the cocoa powder, then in chocolate sauce and about half in sprinkles as. The more sugar the easier they went down. Not that you could really get drunk off of rum balls but it gave a nice warm feeling in your chest and lightened your head enough that it was worth having a few of them. She and Sam kept working and the air around her went a little damp. She’d have to ask her mom if the central air was working in the kitchen. She’d been getting hot in there a lot recently. She could hear the bowls shift as they dipped the rum balls into them and the paper of the tray lightly crinkle when they placed them. Sam cleared her throat at one point and they were more then halfway done. She didn’t know what they would do once there was nothing left to force their focus on so Beth decided to break the silence.

“So how have you been holding up? You know since… the other day?” Beth did not feel the need to say it out loud because she figured Sam would know what she meant. She was right as Sam nodded a tiny bit when she looked over. Her face looked conflicted.

“It's been interesting,” she answered. Beth could get that, “I wasn’t really ready for anyone else in our little squad to know yet.”

Beth was giving a sympathetic nod but then realized what Sam had said. She was still working as if there was not issue in what she admitted. That did not help Beth suppress the heat rising on her neck.

“Anyone else?” Sam had a habit it seemed of saying things that said things besides what she had meant to say.

Sam made an ‘oh’ face as if she realized her implication then she said, “Yeah, Ashley knows.”

Beth looked over at her and almost dropped her half of the dough. Sam had been so upset the other day. She had seemed completely crushed. So much so Beth assumed she was the first person to know about her being gay. Then again coming out never got any easier. From the way she had said it Beth got the impression she’d chosen to tell Ashley. That was upsetting. Sam had admitted or at least she’d heavily implied she was a lesbian. She’d said she wasn’t attracted to Chris because she wasn’t “on that team.” That implied there was no man who could get her “worked up.” So no Sam hadn’t said, ‘I’m a lesbian’ but she didn’t need to. Knowing it made Beth able to see it in her every action. Or maybe she’d always seen it and had just become aware.

Josh had breathed a deep sigh of relief when she came out and said, ‘So we can talk about it now?’ Beth being a lesbian wasn’t even remotely a secret. Their friends joked she was like walking into a brick wall of gay that got bigger and gayer every day. Sam definitely knew. She knew that and yet she had chosen to come out to Ashley instead of her, a fellow lesbian. Beth tried not to take it to heart and failed terribly.

Were their places switched, she would’ve come out to Sam first.

“You told Ashley?” Beth said finishing up with placing her balls on the tray. It sounded as antagonistic as it felt. There was no way Sam missed it. She half-smiled placing the last of her treats on the tray too.

“Yeah, I did,” Sam answered not looking at Beth, “A year ago almost exactly actually.”

“Why Ashley?”

“It just came up,” Sam shrugged, “At that big party Mike always throws at the end of the school year. We were on the back porch and the conversation just led there.”

“Yeah? How?” She sounded as bad as Josh when he pushed an issue. But a year?! Ashley had known Sam was gay for a year because Sam had chosen to tell them. Sam came out to them. Sam picked them.

“We were talking about stuff,” Sam said vaguely and waved her messy hand as if presenting said stuff where Beth could see it.

“What kind of stuff?” Why was she grilling Sam like this? Sam had every right to choose who she came out to and when she did it.

“Sex,” Sam admitted blushing but not because she was embarrassed. But because she knew that Beth would be and she was right, “We were talking about sex. More specifically sexual fantasies.”

Beth wondered what exactly the details of that conversation entailed for it to lead to Sam coming out. She shied out of asking though because in addition to a run down on Sam’s side of their talk she would probably also get one for Ashley’s side. There was silence for a long while. They just quietly finished working together covered in thick air. Maybe that was why with absolutely no prompting she admitted, “I ended up telling Ashley because they didn’t have much trouble picking up on the fact that I did not find stubble sexy, which by the way they went into a lot detail about exactly where they wanted to feel said stubble and who’s specifically they wanted it to be.”

Chris. Even not taking the crush everyone knew they had on him or their current relationship status into account Beth could guess. He had been on T for awhile and he was starting to get noticeable stubble. She had a hard time believing it was coincidence their admission of wanting scratchy stubble on their… wherever someone might want it (well she didn’t know, she was gay) was confessed that close to the time Chris was finally sporting some. Beth felt that tightness in her stomach again. It was spreading up her chest slowly. Sam was smiling as if the memory made her both happy and sad at the same time. There was a glint in her eyed she always got when the topic of Chris and Ashley came up these days.

“How does it not bother you?” Beth asked sliding the tray into the freezer when Sam opened the door.

“How does what not bother me?” she asked. She’d asked it genuinely. She didn’t know what Beth had meant by that which was astounding on its own. They had started clean up as they talked.

“Chris and Ashley.” Beth could hear the ‘well duh’ in her own tone. Sam smiled her way and it was a much happier one. She shrugged before she focused on the task at hand again.

“I guess it just doesn’t.” Beth didn’t like that answer. Then she realized that was because she had asked the wrong question.

“Okay honestly, I just don’t get it, Sam, you seem really happy about it. Why?” Beth asked as she put their ingredients away and Sam rinsed their tools to put in the dishwasher. She was there enough and the two had done this enough that she knew how to work it. Once loaded and running they made their way over to wipe the counter-top. Sam shrugged again. She rubbed very hard and looked like she was thinking even harder. That or she was trying to polish the porcelain until she could see her face in it.

“They really like each other,” Sam finally said, “And they’re happy. I don’t think I’ve ever seen them this happy actually.”

She and Beth were getting steadily closer as they cleaned. Sam’s eyes stayed down on the counter but her own kept tilting up to glance at her baking partner. She was wearing that sad smile again. It become clear to Beth after a moment Sam was not going to say anything else about it. They were happy so she was happy. That made sense. They were. Beth had started looking at them so she could see it. Sam had a big heart. Something like this would make her happy. There was no reason to suspect anything more. That wasn’t the truth though. Sam was far too invested in Chris and Ashley for it to be.

\---

“Why can’t Chris just come here to fix your phone?”

It was actually Hannah who asked, not Josh who was lounging on the couch and eating corn chips with no regard for the rule against doing so in their living room. (To be fair their basically absent parents would never catch him.) Chris had probably told him this already. It had been the only thing she could think of that made even any amount of sense as the overzealous love they had for their cell phones might be the only thing she and Chris had in common.

“Most of the parts he needs and the tools he has to use are small and he is afraid he will lose something if he brings it all over.” She had practiced this so there was less chance of fumbling. Fumbling almost always meant lying. It had taken her too long to come up with this lie.

“So when are you heading out?” Hannah asked. This was the hard part of her lie but she couldn’t be out driving their car through the neighborhood when she was supposed to be over at Chris’ place. Jess was spending the weekend with her mom and their parents were on another one of their romantic escapades. Chris was alone in his house. (Until he and Ashley got back later that was. She had it to hand it to him, he had planned this night well.) So Chris had offered to let her hang at his place until the two got back from their double feature. Knowing she had such few options here she’d taken him up on it. But there was an off chance Chris and Jess’ parents or Jess and her mom would stop by for something they forgot and if they didn’t see her, the Washington car would quickly inform them one of them three was there. That would be especially weird with Chris’ pickup truck not there. Not taking the car was less of a risk.

“I’m not,” she started slowly, “He’s picking me up in case either of you want to use the car tonight.”

They both gave her a skeptic look. Beth hated being a part of anything like this. She was a simple girl, who liked things simple. She had no patience for teenage drama. She was straight forward. She could lie but that didn’t mean she liked to. She felt like the rock inside her was going to explode all the time. Thank god it was the summer or she would have been distracted during class. Chris would be there in barely five minutes though. She would not have to be lying to her siblings in a few moments. In less than thirty minutes she would be safely hidden away at his place.

“Bah!” Hannah whined, “First Sam, now you. I’m gonna be stuck with Josh all night!”

“Feeling the love, Han.”

“I’m sorry, but I have to get it fixed.”

“Yeah sis, you know Beth would die without her phone.” Beth glared but then she heard a car horn (Chris couldn’t text her “broken” phone after all). It was go time.

“Alright then see ya both later,” she called trying not to rush out of the room. How had she been roped into this absolute bullshit? She was out the door and sitting by Chris so soon he hadn’t been able to turn the engine off. She waved wildly at him. He shifted gears and was soon driving back towards his place. She was out of breath. From running or lying to her siblings, she didn’t really know which but she was. Chris looked over at her worry in his eyes.

“You alright, Beth?”

She glared at him hard. At least he looked guilty and had sounded genuinely concerned. They were both quiet. She reminded herself that this was for Josh as much as it was for Chris but it was at the end of the day for Chris. He was the closest thing she would ever have to a childhood friend outside of Josh and Hannah. They weren’t alike in really any way but they were kind of like kin. Probably because neither were comfortable hurting the people who were most important to them. Which is how they’d ended up here.

“I’m scared,” Chris said glancing at her quickly, “I really don’t know in what way he’s gonna take this and I don’t think I like either of the outcomes. Good or bad. So I’m scared. He means a lot to me.”

Beth wanted to ask if Josh meant so much to Chris then why were he and Ashley doing this. She knew that wasn’t fair. Sam was right. How long was someone expected to fight off natural urges? She wished she could get into Sam’s mindset and be happy for them, understand them, could believe things would work out. She wished she knew like Sam did why it had to be this way. She wished she was happy for them the way Sam was with her cute little red-faced laughs and her sly little smirks or winks when she saw them together. She wished she knew how to handle this like Sam could.

But then Sam was a remarkable person in a way Beth could never be.

“I know, Chris.” Really though, she didn’t.

“I don’t know where this thing with Ashley is going, I barely even know how it started,” he confessed very quietly. Then he laughed in a telling way, his ears bright red, “Well, I mean I know how it started.”

“Don’t push this.”

He laughed a more nervous laugh then said, “We just want to figure out us before we figure out Josh.”

That Beth realized made sense.


	4. Parole

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A break is always nice.

“Why don’t you just come hang out with me?” 

If Josh’s inquiry had started the fire then Sam’s had turned the heat up. She and Ashley had met her and Chris at his place. Sam was Ashley’s excuse to their father of where they would be overnight. Chris and Ashley had clearly both felt outside help was needed. Those two agreed on a lot of things. Hell, most things. She’d heard agreement was good for a relationship. 

“Sure, I mean why not?” Beth answered as Chris and Ashley excitedly rushed to his pick-up with a goodbye that sounded like a sigh of relief and a huge amount of ‘thank you’s.’ Ashley even hung their head out the window to call one last one as they drove away. Sam was smiling and giggling as she watched them leaving. This time Beth understood it. It was admittedly a very cute display. The two of them looked so happy to be heading out on their first real date together. It was not Chris or Ashley’s smile that made this all feel worth it though. 

It was Sam’s. What a ridiculous hopeless romantic she was. It was adorable.

“So, what are we getting up to then?” Beth asked as she got in the passenger side of Sam’s little hybrid. It made her feel like a giant. Especially as the seat had been adjusted by and for skinny, mini Ashley. Beth fumbled with it after her seat belt was on. Sam snickered her way. Sam was more bratty than Beth would have thought she was. But then she should have known Sam was bratty. Shouldn’t she have?

“Can we pick somewhere to go, chuckles?” Beth asked rolling her eyes and looking out the window to hide her slight smile.

“Oh you know,” Sam chimed up happily, “There is this new evening time boating rental not too far off. I’ve been dying to check it out but it’s hard without another rower.”

“And you didn’t ask Hannah because she’d get ‘tired’ halfway and you’d be rowing both of you back.”

“Well, she’s sweet but-”

“I know, Sam,” Beth interrupted finally just allowing Sam to see her smile, “I grew up with her.”

Sam shrugged with her own half smile. Beth leaned back to look out the window. It was a nice evening. With summer having just started, the days were already brutal. The nights though, nights like that night, they were dream-like. Like you were asleep but awake. A dream you could walk through and live in but still know you are dreaming. It might be the only peace Beth ever got.

“Sure, why not?” Beth shrugged reclining her seat, “Would be nice to see the moon on the water.”

“Right?” Sam agreed making the necessary changes in route to start heading that way, “I love summer nights more than any other time of the year.”

“Really?” Beth asked. That she knew for a fact was something Sam had never told her because it was her favorite as well, “Not spring days for morning jogs or fall afternoons for hiking? Summer nights?”

“Well, yeah,” Sam answered as they stopped at a light, “I love those times too. I love any time I get to spend outside, doing pretty much anything. But there’s something special about summer nights. It feels, I don’t know, almost like you’re dreaming. As if you are asleep and dreaming but also somehow awake and know you are dreaming. A dream that feels strangely real.”

That wasn’t weird. Lots of people would describe summer nights that way. Lots of people loved summer nights more than any other time of the year. In fact it was probably incredibly common as summer nights were quite lovely. It wasn’t an awful time of year by any stretch of the imagination. Unlike something like winter morning where everyone hid inside. Summer nights were beautiful according to most people.

So why did it feel like she and Sam had just connected on a very deep level?

\---

Sam reminded Beth of a puppy when they were out anywhere, which was a cute albeit annoying pet. She was so jittery up to the rental booth. She ran toward the dock. Beth stayed about three steps behind her. Looking over the edge she laughed a little. Beth saw why not long after.

“I like the seahorse,” Sam said through a huge smile, “But you can pick if you want to.”

“The seahorse is fine,” she sighed. Based on everything they had seen thus far, the bright colors, the big flashing lights and little animal caricatures all over the booth it was clearly a place designed not for teenagers like them but for families with children. The man from the rental booth came up behind them to look over the side. He had to untie their boat after all.

“Oh, these are for the kids,” he said, he couldn’t be much older than them, “We have some plain ones off the other edge for older people.”

Sam laughed again once she saw Beth’s face. She followed the guy first and Beth took up the rear. She had clearly found Beth’s agitation and following sigh of relief funny. Sam found lots of stuff funny. If brightness was a person, she thinks it would’ve been Sam. Not someone who was like Sam. As in Sam herself. She climbed down very carefully but she was an expert climber she still made it look graceful and easy. Beth hoped she didn’t look awkward going down behind her. The guy explained they could either sit together in the middle or on either end. Sam had already sat herself on the middle bench so Beth sat beside her. Sam was going as soon as the guy was heading to the ladder. Beth started to row quickly to keep up with her. When she did Sam rowed even faster which made Beth speed up too and soon… 

“Sam! You’re gonna make us spin in a circle.”

“Not if you keep up with me.”

“You’re impossible.”

“That sounds like you’re giving up already.”

All the Washington siblings had three important traits in common; their endless love for one another, hard-headed, heels dug in the ground stubbornness and an absolute refusal to lose! Beth sped herself up at a twice the rate of Sam which turned them the other way for a brief moment, but soon Sam was back on her game and they shifted back.

“Come on, Beth,” Sam teased, “You gotta be better than this.”

“Rowing isn’t a competition!” Beth wished she sounded more angry when she said it.

“I believe we’ve made it one.” Sam’s voice matched hers in mirth.

“This is meant to be cooperative.” Beth looked right at Sam as her body rocked in hers and then on the shift Sam’s much smaller body rocked into Beth’s. There was no way for their bodies to not connect and rub together as they were sitting on the same bench. The boat was pretty small too so even if they wanted to separate they would not be able to. Not that Beth had any desire to move away from Sam. They had pretty much peaked in speed so they were using body weight to urge the tiny craft to go to the other side. Beth pushing all her strength against Sam and then vice versa. Left, right, left, right, left, right, left. It a chaotic, swerving mess that quickly veered hard one way before it sharply turned the other way. Their shoulders kept bumping together in a way that felt more like being jostled around on a roller coaster than drifting through the water. Their boat started to tilt when they pushed so they were shaking it too much. Beth noticed this but if she stopped then Sam would be the ‘winner.’ She must be feeling it too. As Beth slowed Sam started laughing hard as she was prone to doing.

“Getting tired,” she said very smugly, “We can slow down if you need to, Lizzie.”

Oh, that was it.

She knew it was going to happen. Knew and didn’t care. She pulled her body back and thrust hard at Sam who was consumed in her laughter. A loud eek was the last thing Beth heard before the splashing of water as Sam went down, took the boat with her, which subsequently took Beth with it. The water was much less clear and burned her eyes much worse than her pool did. Spinning she pushed herself what felt like up and smacked her head before she moved to the side a little bit and broke the surface.

She could breath again but it was almost pitch black. She couldn’t see the stars or moon. Turning she caught no sight of the dock. It was just black everywhere. She had come up underneath their currently upside-down boat. There was breathing. Other than her own that was. She turned that way.

“Beth?” Yep, Sam. 

“Yeah?”

“Okay, good,” Sam’s tone had left behind jovial friend and transformed into concerned mom. She was almost whispering and that made the rasp in her voice stand out more. It was the kind of voice Beth imagined a sexy late night radio show host used to intrigue an insomniac, male audience. Sam would be good at that. Seducing strangers in the dark with just her low voice. There was light filtering inside from somewhere. Wherever from it hit Sam’s blonde hair at just the right angle it looked like she was the source of the light. This time it was Beth’s turn to laugh.

“What?” Sam asked, less worry in her voice and more innocent curiosity.

“I was right,” Beth said without thinking, “You’re brightness.”

“What?” There was a joy in Sam’s voice again. Oh, no. Beth hadn’t meant to say that. She couldn’t see Sam’s face but she knew the look that she was wearing. Sam loved secrets, Sam loved to listen to whatever people needed or wanted to say. She knew so much about people because Sam loved people. Sam wouldn’t think it was stupid.

“Earlier,” Beth began hesitantly, “I was thinking if the word ‘brightness’ was a person it would be you.”

“Interesting,” Sam responded, “Why brightness?”

“Is that really a question you need the answer to?”

“I suppose not, but I’d like one.”

Beth sighed. What was more ridiculous here? The conversation they were having or where they were having it? The rental guys had seen them fall, right? No one saw this overturned boat and worried they might be drowning under it?

“Because you’re happy a lot. You’re happy most of the time,” Beth told her glad she could not see her face and that Sam couldn’t see hers. She was blushing. She could feel it. She kinda wanted to sink back down into the water and disappear, “You make people happy too. You make so many people’s lives better.”

“Do I make your life better?” she asked it so quietly Beth almost wasn’t sure that she had.

“Of course you do,” she responded, “You make Hannah very happy. That’s really important to me.”

“Oh.”

That was it. That soft answer. It felt like somehow Beth’s answer had been wrong. They didn’t have to stay wadding in the water. They could leave whenever they wanted to. They probably should leave. They still had to find their oars before heading back toward the dock. How much time did they have left? Beth didn’t move and far as she could tell neither did Sam. Moving, leaving, might end something. Something neither of them wanted to be over just yet. Beth almost felt like if she could live in this moment, stress free and coming down off the high of their laughter, she would.

“So what about Hannah?”

“Huh?” How long had they been quiet before Sam asked that?

“What word would Hannah be?”

“Probably Innocent.”

“Or Enthusiasm.” 

“Yeah.” Beth heard how light their voices were and quiet. There was no need to whisper but they were.

“And Josh?”

“Crafty.”

“Can’t argue with that one,” Sam said it in the out of the side of your mouth way. It sounded like she might be thinking before saying, “Matt would be Friendship and Emily would be Ambition.”

“That’s not even a question,” Beth confirmed because it wasn’t.

“Chris?”

“Mischief.” They agreed about a second later. Then they laughed. Crafty and Mischief. Those two went well together. In the worse way possible. Probably why the two had been terrors in their lives for maybe five years. Their lives. Yeah, Sam had been in Beth’s life a long time by then. Her life was brighter for it.

“What about you?”

It shouldn’t have shocked Beth. That question was a given. But she didn’t have an answer. To answer that she’d have to think about herself. Beth didn’t often do that. She had Josh and Hannah and at times even Chris to think about. She didn’t have time to think about herself. The closest she ever got was when she thought about Jess. Or rather being with Jess.

“I think you have to pick,” Beth answered, “No one else got a say in theirs, why should I?”

“Good point,” Sam relented, then she was quiet and Beth presumed she was thinking. Before she could answer though there was a knock above their heads. Someone had either noticed that their boat was upside-down in the water or the rental guy came looking for them as they hadn’t come back after their time ended.

Time bought that felt like nowhere near enough.

\---

“It’s quite the piratey evening we’re having, huh?” Sam said before her mouth was consumed with her food again. Once (mostly) dried off and not so subtly glared at by the rental place guy Beth realized she was insanely hungry. She had been too nervous about lying to Josh and Hannah to remember to eat. Sometimes she could lose track of herself. Normally she probably wouldn’t have remembered until she was back home and the fear of getting caught had completely died down. Sam had a way of reminding Beth she existed.

“I don’t think pirates eat their fish wrapped in seaweed and rice,” Beth said dipping her own sushi in soy sauce, “And I know they don’t sink their own boats. Unless they are terrible pirates who are in a serious need of a career change.”

“Our boat didn’t sink. It just flipped over.”

“And who’s fault was that?”

“Maybe the girl who shoved me over the edge? Should have gotten her license plate number.”

“Hey there Bonnie, don’t put all the blame Clyde.” Sam laughed at that. She was easy to make laugh. She was easy to make happy. Beth liked easy, too much of her life was complicated as it was.

“Why does everyone in your family do that?” she asked trying to eat between talking and laughing, “You can talk without slipping a movie reference into every conversation you know?”

“Force of habit,” Beth answered playing with her chopsticks between bites. Not her habit but it was one. 

“I never took you for a movie lover,” Sam commented as Beth forced herself to continue her meal, “You’re always so nonchalant about movie night. As if you don’t care what we watch.”

“I don’t.”

“And yet movies are a passion of yours?” Sam was egging her on. She and Josh should put together a detective team since they were both good at getting information out of people. Especially information people did not want to give-up. Puppy-dog eyes wasn’t quite the right term for the look she would pull. It was too knowing and devilish for that term. Either way Beth would crack. She'd learned how not to with Josh. He was her brother after all. She had caught onto all of his tricks. Sam was a different story. Sam saved her ability too much for Beth to accurately judge a good defense. Besides Beth was a liar, not a secret keeper. Even if that was apparently her current role in life.

“No but it’s everybody else’s,” she explained her eyes on her food, “The rest of my family I mean. Director for a father, actress for a mother, a brother and sister ready and eager to keep up their legacies. Washingtons are all artists going back years in our family line. Pretty sure we have an ancestor with a few paintings in a museum overseas. Creative pursuits are in my blood. Or they should be anyway.”

Sam waited and Beth knew she was in listening mode. She would stay quiet and wait until absolutely sure Beth did not want to go into details about this. Beth was not much of a talker. She never had been. She didn’t have anything to say. Though if she wasn’t a talker and she wasn’t a listener, what was she?

“People adapt,” Sam said it, not her, “Sometimes they have to.” 

“I don’t get it,” Beth admit, “Besides, I can’t even do it. I don’t have mom or Hannah’s raw passion and I don’t have dad or Josh’s natural eye. So I couldn’t if I wanted to.”

“Do you want to?” It was a real question. It wasn’t leading and it wasn’t implying if she did of didn’t. Sam did not assume either was the case and wanted genuinely to know which way she felt.

“Once in a while, yeah,” Beth answered with a shrug, “Most of the time, no. I like who I am.”

“I like who you are, too.” Sam was leaning on the table her way and smiling. She was glowing again, only this time it was from the candle on the table. She had a yellow glow before and this one was so much more peach. She hadn’t known there were so many different ways a person could to light up and shine in the dark. It was nice. Like before Beth felt a pull like a magnet bring her to lean on the table towards Sam as well. Their table was small and they were rather close but they kept drifting. Soon they would have to stand if they kept it up. Beth felt like she might. Had all this been happening for awhile? It felt like something she was vaguely aware of but she still didn’t know what it was. She couldn’t put much thought into it though as up to their table walked the object of affection herself.

“Hey guys,” Jess’ sweet voice greeted with a beautiful woman behind her who looked how Beth would imagine Jess might look like some day. If that was the case then Beth might have just become even more attracted to Jess than she had been before if that was possible. The woman smiled kindly, if less enthusiastically, at them. Figures not only did she get caught not with Chris but by the exact person she was most worried about finding her out. Looked like she would've been better off staying at their place after all.

Sam looked about as thrown off as Beth felt. She clearly had not on any level thought they would get caught in their lie. (No! Chris and Ashley’s lie!). Sam was going to be useless to her. Beth might not have the best handle on this herself either seeing as it was Jess and asking Beth to be put together in front of her crush was asking a few elephants to walk on a tightrope, possible but not without a lot of hard work.

“Hey, Jess,” she answered kicking Sam a little under the table, “You here for dinner?”

“Yeah, mom wanted to go somewhere more fancy but this has to be the best sushi place in town and mom always let’s me pick where we eat when we go out but she gets to pick what we’re going to be having for dinner. It’s a cute little tradition thing of ours.”

“Jess has great taste,” her mother piped in with a voice as sweet as her daughter’s but with a seductive nature of an older woman. Beth would swear she felt her and Sam both melting from hearing her speak. Talk about a MILF. “It’s nice to see looks aren’t the only thing she inherited from her young mother.”

“Oh, right!” Jess said as if she had been reminded of something, “Mom, these are two of my friends, Sam and Beth. I think I met Beth around the time you moved to Paris.”

Abandoned her to go to Paris is what she meant. Beth remembered how much denial Jess had been in those first few weeks and how much she cried during the months after. Most people might have run out a brand new friend once a ton of baggage was dumped into their lap. Beth was not most people and she was there for her every step of the way. She was vulnerable underneath all of that glitz and glamour and charm and confidence and beauty and- Point was Beth felt like she might have been the only person to ever see that Jess. The real Jess. She was even better than public Jess. Though both were pretty great.

“It’s very nice to meet you.” There was pause after. Beth was unsure if she should call this woman ‘Mrs. Riley’ or not. Legally Mrs. Hartley was Mrs. Riley (though she had not changed her name.)

“Yes, it is,” Sam said saving her from having to figure that out. She was too far away for a handshake so she did a cute nod/bow thing in acknowledgment instead. Beth stifled a laugh. Rough and tough Sam always had the hardest time interacting with her more “cultured” friends’ families. Beth was pretty sure her comfort with Hannah and their near constant absence were the only reasons she could handle the Washington parents.

“Same to you, girls,” her mother responded seemingly unfazed by Sam’s gesture, “I believe Jess has told me about you both. Though I know she’s told me about you, Beth.”

“Oh yeah?” Beth dared to be hopeful and she really shouldn't have.

“Yes, she’s the sister of your little boyfriend, isn’t she, honey?” Her tone was teasing. Oh, she was just another afterthought to one of her siblings. In this case Josh. That was to be expected.

“Mom! Don’t embarrass me!”

She winked at the other two girls apparently expecting them to see the humor in it. Sam genuinely did seem to find friendly pleasure at Jess’ flustered state. She knew. It wasn’t hard to see. You don’t spend as much time with a group of people as the ten of them did without everyone knowing who everyone else liked. 

“Sorry dear,” Jess' mother said not sounding like she meant it.

“Okay ladies,” Jess said she clearly didn’t want to risk embarrassment any further. “It was nice to see you but my mom and I need to get a table.”

“It’s fine,” Sam said waving them off, “We don’t want to take anymore of your time with your mom away from you.”

“Yeah, well I’m sure you two would like us to get out of here anyway,” Jess said with suggestion behind her words. Beth realized with horror Jess thought they were on a date. She didn’t have a chance to correct her before the mother and daughter pair were off to their own table. 

“Oh don’t worry,” Sam said this time being the one to kick her under the table, “We’ll clear it up later. Besides who is gonna believe Jessica Riley queen of rumors?”

Beth knew no one would believe Jess or they would simply take whatever she said with a grain a salt. Beth and Sam in casual clothes eating at a place they all frequented would be hard for Jess to really sell as them on a date. No, she was much more upset her crush thought she was here on a date with Sam and not only seemed okay with it but downright thrilled by it! Sam probably would not be smiling if it had been her crush who found the two of them out alone together sitting at a tiny candlelit table and nearly squealed in glee at the sight.

‘Wait who does Sam even have a crush on?’ Beth thought to herself. She knew who everyone else in their little group was crushing on except for Sam, ‘Maybe she doesn’t like anybody.’

Lucky for her because this had ruined her night. She had been having a nice time and she’d almost forgotten she and Sam were out because she was hiding from her siblings. It was starting to feel like they were just hanging out for the fun of it. Well, they were. Sam didn’t have to invite Beth to come spend the night with her but as they were being used as excuses they might as well have a little fun. Fun that had abruptly ended as Beth was pulled back into the reality of her life.

“Charity.” Beth looked up from her food after Sam said it. “Lucky you that’s a very beautiful word.”

“What?”

“You’d be Charity. You give to everyone selflessly and unconditionally. That’s a beautiful thing, Beth.”

That made her feel better, if only by a tiny bit.

\---

Chris’ truck was already back when Sam and her pulled up to his place. Neither he nor Ashley was in it or near it or anywhere else in sight. Some of the lights were on in the house though. Sam had a cute, impish smile across her face she tried to hide with her hand. Beth rolled her eyes. 

“Yeah, they probably are,” Beth said. Sam had to hold back her snickering. She debated informing Chris she was there either by texting him or even ringing his doorbell, but she had no desire to ever interrupt Chris and Ashley again ever. She wished she hadn’t done it already and not just because of what she’d seen.

“Text him that I’m bringing you home,” Sam said starting up her car again, “Once he figures out what time it is he’ll worry and who knows how long from now that will be.”

Beth physically felt a shutter run through her at the implication Sam put on that and did not care that Sam saw her. She put her seat-belt back on, after which she took out her phone to text Loverboy. Sam was already heading that way. Beth checked the time once her text was sent. It was pretty late already but maybe Josh and Hannah were watching a late night movie and she could hang with them until she fell asleep. After the night she had, she would need some quiet company. Sam was barely paying attention as she drove probably working off of her instincts to get them to her place and Beth could see her half dancing to the music. This night would have been a hell of a lot worse without her.

Pulling into their driveway Beth saw some figures on the porch. She hoped it was her parents but that was useless. The universe did not like Elizabeth Washington nearly enough to grant her even that much. So of course when they pulled up in front of it they saw Josh and Hannah standing there with her high focus telescope. No surprise her brother and sister had barged into her room to take something while she wasn’t home. They did it so often she didn’t have the energy left to get mad about it.

Once the engine was off Beth got out of Sam’s car slowly. This right here was why she hated this kind of bullshit teenage stuff. How was she supposed to explain this to them? Sam was supposed to be busy tonight too. What was a believable way to explain why they were together? The two of them made their way up the steps and Beth could tell that Sam was much more nervous than she was. Beth was a little annoyed that she seemed to find this whole Chris and Ashley thing amusing up until it looked like she might get in trouble for it.

“Hey,” Hannah asked leaning up from the telescope to look at them, “Where were you two?”

Sam apparently went with the first thing she thought of, “I went out to the fancy ice cream place down by the dock for their fruity shaved ice after I finished baby-sitting and ran into Chris and Beth there.” 

That did not even remotely explain why it was Sam and not Chris who drove her home but Beth had to work off of that. She wasn’t as good on the fly but she was at her core a liar, “Yeah we went after he finished with my phone to get some ice cream because I thought it was the least I could do for Chris. But his mom called because the alarm went off at his place and he had to go check the security system. So Sam offered to bring me home.”

Hannah was nodding a little as though that made sense but behind her stupid Josh, her stupid brother, who always made things worse for Beth by letting his stupid thoughts out of his big stupid mouth had to ask, “You took Chris to get ice cream?”

“Yeah,” she answered feeling like the stupid one here because she remembered right after she said it.

“You took someone who is lactose-intolerant to get ice cream?” And there it was. For god sake's Sam, everyone knew about Chris' food allergies because of how often they had to work around his and Sam’s diets! “I thought you wanted to thank him for fixing your phone, not punish him.”

“They have other things at the place down by the docks, sherbert and smoothies and even those neat little frozen cupcake things.” Well, at least Sam tried to recover.

“Oh yeah," Josh did not sound convinced and her gave them a look much like he had the other day. He held it a lot less time before continued with, "Chris does love those cupcake things. I feel bad for your wallet, sis, because dude can eat maybe a dozen in one sitting.” Josh may have been satisfied with that. It was hard to tell with him. In fact if anyone looked skeptical it was Hannah. She was probably just having some trouble absorbing all the information. That happened with her sometimes.

“What are you two doing?” Beth asked both as a way to switch subjects and because she was honestly wondering what was going on.

“We saw on T.V. that you can see Venus really well tonight so we thought we’d try our hands at it.”

“Really?” Sam asked the implication thrown at Josh clear and agreed with by Beth.

“Really,” he confirmed, “The lens has been pointed at the sky for the majority of the night.”

“The majority?” Beth asked and Josh laughed as Sam went to go see what Hannah was looking at.

“I mean we had to peek at the neighbors once or twice so long as we had it out,” he said dropping down on the porch swing. Beth sat with him and they pushed it into motion with their feet. “Unfortunately, our neighbors are not nearly as scandalous as the media portrays. Eh well, at least looking up at the sky has been nice. It’s really bright out tonight.”

“Yeah,” Beth agreed, not at all looking at the sky with him when she did so, “It really is.”


	5. Sentencing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Indecision is why we have jugdes.

Soon came the Hannah problem.

As if the Chris and Ashley problem wasn’t bad enough as it was. Though she had not been coerced into being another cover story and there had been no group activities where she had to sit in the same room as the three with the knowledge two of them were lying to her brother’s face. However they were still seeing each other behind Josh’s back and she still knew that so it wasn’t much relief. In addition they had been together over two whole weeks since she and Sam “caught them.” Who knows how long it had been going on before that? It sure didn’t look like it was stopping any time soon either so wasn’t it time to tell Josh? She would tell him herself except…

Beth’s promises were written in stone. She never went back on them. She was as good as her word. Beth never made a promise she did not intend to keep and even if she had made it in a spur of the moment decision she had still made it. She had said the word “promise.” She had promised Chris she would stay quiet about it and not tell anyone. Anyone included Josh. She never would have guessed though that anyone also included Hannah and that was a very, very bad thing.

“You sure you can drive man?” Her brother coughed right after he asked it. Beth looked through the game room door towards her brother and his two friends who were coming down the hall away from the basement door. Chris and Josh were in middle of a conversation as Ashley walked next to them silently. With the look on their face and the way their fingers rubbed the sleeve of Chris' shirt, Ashley reminded Beth of a character in one of Sam and Hannah’s cheesy romance movies. Their glossy eyes locked on Chris' face, blissfully in love.

“Yeah, I’m fine,” Chris answered Ashley’s hand twitched like they wanted to grab his hand to hold, “It’s never stopped me before right?”

Beth leaned on the door frame as they got closer. She heard the billiard balls crashing into each other behind her as the trio meandered towards her. None of them seemed to be in much of a hurry. There was a whoop from Sam after a few quick clatters. Sounded like she’d gotten more than one ball into a pocket at once. Chris stopped to lean against the wall caught up in his laughter after her brother whispered something to him while pointing at Ashley. They looked affronted as they too stopped to look at Josh.

“What did you say to him?” Ashley demanded as a smile broke out on their face. They released Chris to walk around him and playfully hit Josh in his chest. “Tell me!”

Josh only laughed in response before he pat them on the head like a dog, “Perhaps when you grow up.”

Ashley swat his hand off them and stood up on their toes to look in his face. “You know you aren’t so big yourself there buddy.”

“I’m big where it counts, friendo,” Josh said stepping back with a shrug. Chris was laughing much less. He stopped completely when Josh continued with a wink, “I could show you if you’d like, Ash.”

Beth saw the look. Hers and his shared 'Josh death look' on Chris’ face. He shouldn’t be worried though Josh flirted with everyone. Hell, Josh flirted with Chris. But this was not about to go well. She just had a feeling. Chris pushed himself off the wall until he was standing between Josh and Ashley again. The two of them smiled widely at each other but it wasn’t friendly. Beth had seen plenty of her guy friends smile at other guys like this before. It was never friendly.

Chris said with a laugh, “You should be careful. They might call you out on your bluff.”

“Pretty sure I still win in that case, bro.” Josh smirked when he said it. “Thinking about it pretty sure they win in that case too.”

“I’d doubt a night with you is something Ashley would count as a win.”

“Probably still be the best they’ve gotten though.”

“What makes you so sure of that?” Beth wanted to smack Chris. Josh wasn’t insulting his ability as a lover. He couldn't because he didn’t know Chris was Ashley’s lover.

“Uh because it would be the only dick they’ve ever had.” Oh fuck. Bad choice of words there, Josh.

“Well then why would you want to make their first experience a bad one. Besides Ashley's probably doing just fine without any dick.”

“Really? Only one way to know for sure though right?” Josh again winked passed Chris’s shoulder at them, “What do you say, Ash? Wanna let Chris get out of here and have some fun?”

Their tones were still playful. Beth hated when Josh did this. When he pushed people like this. He liked to watch people squirm far too much. He knew talking about Ashley like this made Chris’ blood boil. Josh might have even been serious in his inquiry. He certainly wasn’t going to say no if Ashley agreed. Because he didn’t know. He had every right to know but he didn’t. Chris could get him to stop. He just had to tell Josh it genuinely bothered him and why. This wasn’t Josh fault.

Maybe that was why Chris’ face soften and he just laughed, “Thanks for making me feel like the third wheel here, bro.”

“Oh, would you like to stay? My bed is big enough for three,” Josh said with a dark and devilish look. Slightly awkward laughter erupted between them again. Josh’s phone went off and as he reached for it Chris and Ashley gave each other a look.

“Yo, my dudes,” Josh said calling their attention, “It’s that babe again. She’ll be here soon for her dime. So we're gonna have to put our three-way off until another day. Unless you want to put a foursome on the table.”

Chris punched Josh’s shoulder before her brother turned away to disappear into his dungeon once more. His friends followed with their eyes only for a moment. Chris turned back first. He did not look happy. Beth saw Ashley look back for Josh before they moved to take his hand in theirs. Both their smiles had become somewhat awkward but they were still smiling. They were usually smiling at each other.

“How about you take some practice shots before we play again, okay?” Beth heard Sam call before she felt the girl slide up next her. She glanced at Beth for a half second before she looked at the couple in the hall too. They were whispering. Sam leaned against the other side of the door frame. She stayed focused on the others though. Beth did too. Though it was hard to focus on them when she saw out of the corner of her eyes Sam was smiling and snickering to herself. That girl was too cute. Ashley was looking at the ground until Chris put his finger under their chin and tilted their head up to look at him. They giggled at whatever he said. The two looked like they might kiss. Beth had never seen them kiss. It probably looked silly when they did. He was much taller and much bigger than they were. She was surprised that she found the mental image much more endearing than she did gross or annoying.

“You’re happy for them, aren't you?” Sam teased in a whisper. Beth looked at her before rolling her eyes. “Just admit that I’ve won you over Beth. You think they’re sweet.”

“I think they’re being stupid,” Beth answered in her own whisper, “Josh could come back and see them this close spit swapping.”

“Okay.” Sam did not sound like she believed that. She had also said it way too loud. Ashley saw them watching finally and went red. They stepped too far back for Chris to kiss them even if he wanted to. Their eyes seemed to be locked right onto Sam’s. Beth turned her way and saw Sam give Ashley a look she couldn’t read. They seemed to have a whole conversation in about six seconds. Then Ashley pulled Chris back down the hall towards them. Beth and Sam slipped into the room looking at one another.

“Are you taking AP history next semester?” Sam asked still pretty quietly as if they were in the middle of a conversion.

“Yeah, I was thinking about it,” Beth answered as the couple walked passed. Ashley shot one last look at Sam but then yanked Chris forward before he could look back at the girls too.

“What was that about?” Beth asked whispering again. Sam looked away, down at the ground then up at the ceiling. She bit her lip opened her mouth and…

“Guys!” They both turned quickly, “I got one in!”

“That’s great, Han,” Sam said after a pause. Hannah looked between the two once and then her brow knit together. Beth saw Sam shift and look away from her.

Whatever Sam was going to say was lost as she half-jogged over to start up another game with Hannah.

\---

Hannah locked the door behind Sam after she left that evening. Hannah had invited her to stay for dinner in a voice full of implication, but she had refused. Hannah turned to look at Beth and smiled a kind of smile Beth had never seen on her sister’s face. It took her a minute or so to realize why it was strange.

It was forced.

“So wanna order some food with me?” she asked, already walking to their kitchen.

The Washingtons had hired and then quickly cut down the hours of a chef. Their kids were far more comfortable ordering most of their meals out so they only needed a cook when their mom and dad were there. Mom and dad were never there. They worked weird long hours, spent most of their days out and came home to sleep either in the early morning hours or the mid-afternoon. Their kids rarely even saw them leave the house when they did. So family dinners meant she, Hannah and Josh ordered their food from the same place and ate it together.

“Sure,” Beth said following her as if she had a choice. Well she did but Hannah would take it the wrong way because she took everything the wrong way. Speaking of…

“Hey, you know what I’m craving for tonight? Sushi!”

Subtly was not Hannah’s strong suit.

“Oh yeah?” Beth asked hopping on the counter as Hannah searched through their many take-out menus in the drawer for them. Beth needed to get a new one from Herculean Hunger as it looked like someone (Josh) forgot to put it away while they were eating and had torn through it badly. She put a memo about it in her phone. She was on it all the time anyway.

“So Chris did a good job fixing your phone, huh?” she asked pulling out the menu she wanted, “I guess he must have. It took him a long time.”

Beth snatched the menu from Hannah. She would not give this information up. Beth guessed Jess had spread her juicy news around and while the rest of them probably gave it no thought of course gullible little Hannah had taken the bait. In her defense she’d seen Beth and Sam come back home together so she did have a reason to put some stock into what she’d heard. Beth wouldn’t assume she knew though. This was a Josh tactic. Lead a person into thinking he already knew the information he wanted and wait for them to give enough of a clue to confirm it. Hannah was much worse at it but Beth knew where she had seen it. She never fell for it when Josh did it so Hannah had not a chance of coning her. She was dialing the number as Hannah wrote down what she wanted. Before she pressed the call button Beth waved at Hannah’s face.

“Yeah? What?” Hannah looked hopeful when she looked up at her. She was so eager for this to work it looked like she thought maybe Beth had cracked even though she hadn’t said anything in quite awhile. Beth honestly felt a little bad about what she actually said.

“You should see if Josh wants us to get him something too.”

“Yeah, I guess I should.” Hannah’s face fell. She leaned off the counter and made her way slowly out of the door looking back at Beth a few times. Finally she disappeared through it and only then did Beth let her panic show.

Jess had told Hannah. Of course Jess had told her. Sam was her best friend and Beth was her sister. Were Beth the kind of person Jess was, she would have told Hannah first too. She was both the person who had the most right to know and the person most likely to have more information on the topic so she was the obvious go to. Sometimes Beth cursed herself for liking Jess as much as she did but then she would remember how amazing she was and forgive her without her ever knowing Beth had been mad at her. What was she going to say? What could she say? Hannah wouldn’t keep up this tactic long. She was too impatient. Eventually she would say what she meant and demand an answer. If she didn’t get one then she would whine and maybe even cry. So Beth would have to tell her something at least. Something that would explain it to her. Not telling Josh was hard but she could at least rationalize it by telling herself it was better for him and his friendships with Chris and Ashley. That he needed to hear this from one of them, preferably Chris. They knew better than she did what would work best for their relationships with him and each other. She could talk herself into the idea that Chris and Ashley were doing right by him even if they weren’t.

But Hannah?

Sam told Hannah everything and Beth told Hannah everything. They were a tight circle of friends that did not keep secrets from each other. Life was easier that way. There was no hiding or maneuvering or figuring things out. Things were figured out. Things were good there. They had a perfect balance that they were all happy with. Something like this could mess it up. Sam and Beth had something that she did not. It messed up the balance. It threw things out of wack. It meant Sam and Beth were lying to her.

Beth loved Hannah and Beth loved Josh.

She had to pick one. There wasn’t another option. There just wasn’t. It was tell her the truth to comfort Hannah and knowing her by dawn not only Josh but all their friends would know or lie to Hannah more than she already had to protect Josh. So option number one was admit to her sister she’d been covering for Chris. Option number two was either continue to insist she and Sam had bumped into each other or confirm her suspicions that they had “ditched” her. Beth had to chose a side.

“Josh wrote some stuff down that he wants,” Hannah was back far too soon. She passed the paper to Beth and then finished writing her own down. As Beth called though Hannah asked for more things she wanted her to order. Most of it would end up in the fridge. But the three of them loved left-overs.

“About 45 minutes,” Beth said hanging up and looking at Hannah who had moved to lean by her leg. Sam had done that not so long ago.

Hannah bobbed her head left to right and swayed a little, “Okay good, I love the sushi from the place down by the docks, don’t you?”

How long was she going to try this?

“Yeah,” Beth agreed, “It’s easily the best in the neighborhood. They make the perfect rice.”

“It’s been forever since I had it,” Hannah continued her head still bobbing, “Do you remember the last time we had it? It feels like it was so long ago but with my memory it could’ve been last week.”

Beth nodded, “Doubt it, sis. I feel like if it was that short of a time you would remember.”

“I guess I would,” Hannah conceded sadly. She was being persistent. Maybe Beth would have some time to figure out what to say and who to say it to. That was exactly what she needed. So of course it was not what she got.

“You know you can hang out with Sam without me, right?” Hannah finally said. She had gotten tired of the long approach. It was apparently time for her to jump right in, “I mean you’ve done it before so I don’t understand why you’d think you had to hide something like this from me. Sam’s your friend too.”

Beth breathed in deeply, held it for a few seconds and then sighed out, “Hannah.”

She sister’s eyes bore into hers. This was it.

“We just ran into each other.” Josh it was. This was the nicer lie. If there were nice lies. “We weren’t sneaking around you.”

“Then why didn’t you tell me about your dinner?” She looked very sad and confused and afraid.

“Because we thought it would upset you,” said Beth the liar, “Cause we know how much you love it and we thought you might be upset we went without you. Besides Chris had to run home anyway so why not? I hadn’t eaten basically the whole day.”

Hannah nodded looking away. Once more though there was a look on her face Beth didn’t recognize. One she was sure she’d never seen before. Her face was pulled together and she was biting her lip. Maybe she was about to cry. Beth soon realized the look on her face was the pain of someone who knew that they had been lied to. Someone who knew they had been deceived but were also too afraid to say anything. Hannah was hurt. In favor of not hurting Josh, she’d hurt Hannah. But it was a kind of pain she would move on from. Probably rather quickly too. Josh’s could have been deeper and harder. The kind of pain threatening Josh was a pain of betrayal from not one but both of his best friends. Hannah’s was just the pain of her two best friends hanging out one time and not including her when they did. She couldn’t give Hannah any evidence that Beth and Sam just hadn’t wanted her around. She already thought that. No reason to make the wound worse. She would see how untrue that was in no time. Hannah was weak but she would survive this. Josh might lose it, maybe he would break down, could be crushed and feel all alone in the world. His betrayal would feel a hundred times worse than Hannah’s did. She’d move on soon.

She would.

\---

They sat together in the shade watching Hannah practice on their home tennis court not long after that. Hannah was kept on a pretty strict practice schedule even though it was the summer. Mom and dad had hired her a personal coach and everything. Wouldn't want to risk the chance of their little star fading even the slightest bit. They threw her parties for bronze medals. She was the best in their whole school and had gone to regional and national competitions so many times Beth had lost count. She could find out by going into their trophy room if she wanted. Hannah had her own display case. She and Josh shared one, though to be fair there was pretty much nothing in it and what was in it was mostly Beth’s. So that had to mean something at least. Probably not.

“She’s good,” Sam commented leaning against the tree as they watched, “I mean I know she’s good, but watching her during a match is different. You’re focused on the score and who’s winning not just her playing. Watching her on her own though, she’s really good isn’t she? And I mean really good.”

For some reason coming from Sam it was painful. Far more than from Josh or her parents. Maybe it was because Beth did not often feel overlooked by Sam. She might be the only person who saw them on the same level, never judging one higher than the other. Even though she was Hannah’s best friend. But she couldn't really blame her. They didn’t usually watch Hannah during practice. She went out here and Beth and Sam stayed inside to wait for her. Usually baking a snack for them to eat when she was done. That felt too risky considering the conversation she’d had Hannah. The dumbest thing she could do was give Hannah any reason to think Sam and Beth were avoiding her. So they had come outside to sit in the grass with their lunch and watch Hannah and her hunky (according to Jess at least) instructor play tennis for the next two hours. Beth settled herself down on the blanket. They’d brought it out to hangout on as her sister was on the court. She would run over for some water here and there but mostly it was only Sam and her enjoying the breeze and some food together. Beth brought out her speakers to play some music off of her phone. She was trying to pretend she and Sam had just decided to have a picnic. It helped.

“Hey Beth, don’t you play soccer?” Sam asked suddenly, “Why haven’t you ever invited me to one of your games? I go to Hannah’s matches all the time. I hear our team isn’t that good, but I’d watch a few games anyway. I’d like to see you play.”

“Oh, I played for a county team not for our school’s team,” she explained, “It’s filled with nothing but arrogant assholes who have never been told in their lives that maybe they aren’t good at something. You know, those kids whose parents yell at the coaches and demand rewards when they lose. So I used to play for the county team instead.”

“Used to? When did you stop?” Sam sounded shocked to hear she no longer played. Probably because she still had all of her posters up on her walls and her old uniform in her closet. She had a ball or two floating around somewhere as well. She also had trophies in her (and Josh’) display case.

“Last year actually,” she said turning from watching Hannah to watching the sky through the leaves.

“Why? Did you just not like it anymore?” Sam asked and it was an innocent and expected question.

“No, I love soccer.” And she did. She was also good at it. Her team had taken second in the city wide matches more than once. They almost always voted Beth MVP. She was even captain one year. She had played since she was a child having become obsessed with the sport after she and Hannah saw “Bend it like Beckham.” They were 8 and by the next summer Beth was a forward on her county team. In fact in a rare moment of consideration for his youngest child her father had taken her to South Africa for the FIFA world cup when she was 12. He even seemed a little bit into it. It was one of her best memories.

“So why stop?”

‘Elizabeth, soccer is a fine sport and it will certainly look good on your college applications but maybe it’s time for you to consider something less dirty and violent. I mean just look at you, covered in scraps and bruises. And all that mud. You don’t look respectable, dear. I can’t imagine what our family's more influential friends might think if they saw you play. You father and I know some very important people and we’d like them to see your talents, honey. It could be good for your future. So why don’t you try a sport that’s a little more refined? Maybe horseback riding like your sister.’

“I didn’t want to be on an official team anymore.” She attempted a laugh she hoped sounded genuine. “Too much stress and pressure.”

“Being on a team or-” Sam cut herself off then Beth felt her shift until she was also on her back looking up at the sky. “I bet you were really good.”

“I was alright,” she said and she could hear in her tone she’d said it with an air of ‘I rocked it.’

“I am awful at sports,” Sam commented, “I don’t even have a little bit of the coordination for it.”

“You? Uncoordinated?” Her laugh was genuine this time. “I’ve seen you climb over two stories high.”

“That’s different,” Sam said and Beth felt her playfully smack her arm, “Besides I slip up all the time when I’m climbing. I’m just smart enough to stop myself from falling and have ropes to keep me up.”

“You could have fooled me,” Beth said turning to look at Sam and finding she was already looking her, “You make it look so graceful and easy. Like it comes naturally to you. I mean you’re incredible at it and somehow manage to look gorgeous while doing it. I looked like shit after all of my soccer practices and even worse after games. When you come back down to the ground you are basically glowing.”

Sam was blushing something awful. It almost looked like a bad sunburn she was so red in the face. “That’s probably just from all the sweat.”

“Whatever it is, it’s working for you.”

Honestly Beth wondered how Sam was still single. There couldn’t be a girl in the world who wouldn't be attracted to Sam (even the straight ones). Not just her looks either though she was hot. Fit and curvy. She had the cutest round face and a biggest puppy dog smile with pretty hazel eyes. But her best quality was she had the most beautiful soul. Sam must’ve had her pick out of dozens. If she didn’t already she should’ve. Being blind to the beauty of Samantha Giddings was like being blind to the sky.

“You should teach me how to play." Sam said sitting up to pull a large bowl of grapes into her lap and Beth followed suit. They reached their hands in to get sizable handfuls to plop a few into their mouths. Their warm hands rubbing together were such a contrast to the cold fruit. Shrugging and with her mouth full Beth answered.

“Sure, why not?” Then with a big smile she nudged into Sam but didn’t pull back again, “But you have to show me how you climb without looking like frantic mess.”

“Deal,” Sam laughed as they both leaned back against the tree, their shoulders still pressed together and eating their grapes. Beth tossed one at Sam’s head because she had a smug smile. Probably because she felt she’d accomplished her goal of getting Beth to play soccer again. Sam pulled back and then tossed one at her in retaliation. She rolled her eyes and tilted the rest of her grapes into her mouth. Sam waved to an out of breath Hannah as she ran over to them.

Playing soccer again sounded fun. But then Sam seemed to know how to make everything sound fun.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Edit: Okay so I am writing and editing these chapters ahead of time and this chapter (5) was mistakenly labeled with a later chapter's (7) title and summary. Apologies. It has been fixed now.


	6. Pleading Innocent

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> But she knows she's guilty.

Beth walked into her twin sister's room and Hannah instantly stopped talking. She was on her bed with Sam sitting across from her. From the look on their faces Beth wondered if she’d been giving Sam the same spiel she had given her earlier that week. Fear consumed Beth. What if Sam was giving, or had given, Hannah a different story. There was no way Beth could pull Sam out of the room either, not without raising further suspicion about what was happen between them (which was nothing). So instead Beth smiled as warmly as she could and sat in Hannah’s desk chair.

“What are we talking about?”

Sam laughed with that same cute little smile she’d had since the towel incident as Beth had decided to call it hoping to eliminate the whole ‘Chris and Ashley were having sex on a desk’ part from her mind. Hannah looked at her like she’d gone rabid. That made sense. Beth probably never asked to join in on their gossip but she needed to know what Sam had been saying. Hannah looked over to Sam unsure of what she found so funny. She covered her mouth. Hannah looked back at her sister before answering.

“Josh and I are planning to have a party this weekend since mom is going to be at her big, fancy gallery opening in New York City.” Beth could hear the annoyance in her twin’s voice. Right it had been one of those rare moments Hannah had not gotten her way. She’d begged to go. Hannah loved New York City. She stomped her feet and pouted and cried and for once mom didn’t give in to her immature behavior. 

There was no use putting stock in that though. Melinda Washington was only leaving oh-so-precious Hannah behind because the show permitted no one younger than 21 due to the graphic (nudity) and mature (sex) themes of the art. Mom was also meeting with someone about possibly taking a starring role in their show. A Broadway musical of course. She had pacified Hannah by saying she’d be sure to see if she could get Hannah an audition for one of the minor parts in the show. Neither Beth nor Josh had been offered this.

“What about dad?” Beth asked happy to know they had not actually been discussing her and Sam but she couldn’t drop the topic once on it. That would look weird.

Hannah gave Beth a look, “He’s in Mexico… has been for two weeks. For the shoot, remember?”

“Right, yeah.” Sam was giving her a weird look. She could keep her mouth shut but never keep her face neutral.

“You aren’t gonna make a thing out of this, are you?” Hannah must have picked up on Beth’s slowly dulling tone. She was actually just bored with the conversation. She didn’t like big parties. When their small group of ten got together to goof around getting intoxicated in whatever ways suited them best, Beth could have the time of her life. But her house full of people she either didn’t like, barely knew or didn’t know at all, dozens of people drunk and screaming and knocking into each other, people getting far too cozy with other people on her furniture, finding these same people passed out in nearly every room the next morning, the disgusting mess that was left behind that never bothered Josh and Hannah, both of whom obviously expected her to call their house cleaners. 

Beth was not a fan of any of that but Hannah and Josh would whine if she skipped out. She was going to have to make sure her door was locked. If Hannah and Josh were comfortable with booze, puke and other people’s bodily fluids in their beds good on them but Beth would rather streak around a baseball diamond a couple dozen times with the stands full of people and her body coated in golden glitter than wake up to any of that.

“No, you guys can do whatever.” Not that Hannah would have changed her mind were Beth not okay with it. She would just complain. Beth could deal, she’d gotten used to it. Sam gave her a small smile Hannah missed.

“Okay good, Matt offered to send a mass invite for me to pretty much the whole school after I sent a private one to our little circle of friends,” Hannah said as if the exclusivity was needed. Hannah liked being picky about things (and Matt liked Hannah). She liked that she had the power to exclude people from what were easily the coolest parties anyone in their neighborhood or school threw (though she was too nice to go through with it). That was more thanks to Josh than her. Their older brother knew how to party and did not shy away from anything that entailed (he’d gotten Mike and Ashley to drop acid with him once) but Hannah wasn’t exactly slacking. Their house parties were one of the few times she allowed herself to go crazy. One of the few times she threw away all her timid awkwardness and would let her inner she-lion out as Sam put it.

Honestly though seeing Josh and Hannah have a blast was kind of what Beth needed. She had felt so much like she was hurting them she needed to see them having fun. Even though Hannah would chase Mike around every once and while causing Beth to have to chase her and Jess would grind up on Josh which she would try to ignore but would catch in her peripheral vision now and again. Mostly though there would be too many people for her to be able to or have to keep track of the two.

Crazy as it sounded Beth wanted to let go too. She wanted to have fun and not have to stew in all the tension that existed in their group these days between Hannah and Josh and Jess and Chris and Ashley. She wanted a big crowd where that would be drown out by the high energy of the people around her. So maybe for once in her life Beth was actually kind of looking forward to one of her siblings’ stupid out of control parties.

Most especially if it meant Sam would look as excited and giddy during it as she did taking about it.

\---

“You’re actually on-board with this party thing?” Sam asked her once the two were out of the house and out of earshot of Hannah. She’d chilled out in the last couple days, just like Beth knew she would. Hannah was not all that complex and Beth had spent her entire life with the girl. She might know her better than Hannah herself did.

“Sure, why not?” Beth said dropping her ball to the ground. Sam gave her a look that said maybe she didn’t want to say what she was about to. Then she started setting up Beth’s home net the best that she could manage and she got it standing steady and straight. Beth used her foot to bounce the ball back up into the air and then passed it between the top of her foot and her knee a couple time. She did not miss it a single time and she felt a little smug that a year after she quit playing she still had her natural talent for the sport.

“Alright my ass,” she heard Sam say as she made her way over, “You look like a pro.”

Beth knocked the ball up into the air one last time before she caught it in her hands, “That’s probably just the outfit.”

“Maybe,” Sam relented, “I mean you know what they say about how the ladies love uniforms.”

“Not sure a dirty old soccer uniform is what they mean by that.”

“Well it’s what I mean and that’s all that matters.”

Beth did not have to wear her uniform. But Sam had insisted she do so ‘for authenticity,’ for the fact that she’d never seen her in it and because, according to the blonde anyway, ‘You look so cute in it.’ Sam herself was in her tight gym shorts and a sporty crop top. In the eyes of the very, very gay Beth this was not a bad thing in the least. In fact seeing Sam dressed that might have actually been making her even more gay.

“Let’s just get to playing,” Beth said dropping the ball to the ground again, “Here I’ll show you how to dribble the ball first.”

“Dribble?” Sam asked looking confused, “Like in basketball? I thought you didn’t touch the ball with your hands in soccer.”

Beth laughed, “You don’t. You dribble it with your feet. That’s what it’s called when you’re kicking the ball forward.”

“Oh,” Sam said coming to stand by her, “I told you I am completely inapt with sports.”

She was. Terribly so. Beth moved forward slowly showing Sam how she knocked the ball to one side, stopped it with the opposite foot then knocked it back only to repeat the process edging the ball forward with every slight kick. Beth went about twenty feet away then came back. Explaining as she did so, “You want to hit it with you insole so you have more control over where the ball goes. Your toes will knock it forward but usually out of your personal space. You don’t want to chase the ball, you want to guide forward.”

Despite clearly explaining this Sam kicked the ball with her toes by mistake and had to chase after it more than she didn’t and sometimes she knocked it into the air (once it’d flown passed Beth’s head). She also hit it with her heel way too far back and tumble over it three to five times. Beth tried to show Sam a few more times. Still she did not get it.

“Told you,” Sam said when the ball flew up into a tree and they were afraid for a moment it would not come back down.

“Alright.” Beth was really trying not to laugh. Sam was good at almost everything. It was kind of nice to see her frantically running and tripping. Seeing her not have control of something was endearing in a strange way. It made her remember Sam was no more perfect than she was. It was comforting to know that even someone as amazing as Sam had flaws.

It made Beth feel less bad about her own.

\---

“I saw Chris and Ashley the other day,” Sam said as they walked through the kitchen door. Beth turned her way and motioned for her to shush. Not only did she not want to talk about the couple she did not want Josh or Hannah to overhear whatever Sam had to say. She would have said this, but Sam always got so excited when it came to this topic which meant she smiled wide and wiggled so happily. So Beth chose to let her share a little bit as long as she stayed quiet.

“We see them all the time,” Beth reminded her as she got a water for each of them, “The three of you might as well have your own bedrooms here.”

“Pretty sure with the way things are Chris and Ashley would only need one room.”

Beth glared. Sam covered her mouth to hide her smile and tried to look apologetic as she took her water and she sat on the closest stool. They took long drinks. Sam was still drinking when Beth finished and she could see her smirk wrapping around the bottle’s opening. Beth always assumed Sam saw Chris the same way she did. As a brother. Beth would never want to be informed this much on Josh’s sex life. She didn’t want to be on Chris’ either. But Sam was always so eager to talk about it and Beth was her only outlet.

“I meant I saw them somewhere else,” Sam clarified, “That is I was hanging out with Ashley at their place discussing the whole thing when the man in question showed up. He’d bought them this funky headband with light-up kitten ears he said reminded him of them. They kissed his face until it looked like his head might explode from the heat of him blushing. It was adorable.”

Beth was surprised how much she meant it when she said, “Sounds it.”

Sam giggled a bit before she continued, “They said I didn’t have to leave but I did anyway. Ashley is not so good at whispering and I overheard them say after a proper kiss they were gonna wait until I left to put it on so he could see how it looked. I got the impression they meant they wouldn’t be wearing much more than that when they did so I decided not to hold them up.”

Beth couldn’t believe it but she laughed. Of course Chris would find something as goofy as light up kitten ears sexy. Part of the story did stick out to her though. Sam had Ashley to talk about all this with. So why did she feel the need to share it with her? Ashley was most likely dying to share everything they could on their new relationship. Beth guessed there were most likely just things Sam felt she could not say to Ashley. Probably out of a fear of either offending or embarrassing them. Well being whatever people needed her to be was something Beth was an expert in so she could do that. Sam made it easy.

‘Besides at least I kind of enjoy the gossip when it’s with Sam,’ she thought as Sam sighed deeply, leaning back against the counter after Beth hoped up on it. It was a dreamy, longing kind of sigh that stirred something primal inside of Beth. This girl had always been something else.

“The beginning of a relationship is great,” Sam said with half-lidded eyes, “It’s all sweetness and sex followed by sweetness and sex. And then there’s more sweetness and even more sex. It’s just amazing.”

“Wouldn’t know,” Beth said feeling a little bad for actually being envious of her two friends for once. Sam made what Chris and Ashley were doing sound so very appealing. She wouldn’t want to stop if she were one of the ones doing it either.

“Huh,” Sam said her face more serious, “I guess not. You haven’t really been in a relationship before, have you? At least I know you haven’t had a girlfriend since you came out.”

“I mean I sorta have,” Beth confessed, “But my longer relationships were with guys and the few I’ve had with girls never stretched long enough to get to any of the real sugary or sexy stuff. So I mean, no, I don’t really know what it’s like to be in the honeymoon stage. I’ve never gotten out of the awkward little touches and stealing glances or any of that shit part of things.”

“Don’t worry,” Sam said with a wave of her hand, “If it makes you feel any better I’ve only ever had one girlfriend and it didn’t last long.”

“I didn’t know that,” Beth said feeling a familiar feeling burn inside of her. She knew what it was but the people usually responsible for it weren’t there. Maybe the two were in Josh’s room together and she’d become so attached to Jess she could just feel her energy. Could just know when she was there.

“No one does. Not even Hannah. And Ash just knows that I’m not a virgin.”

“How’d it happen?” Beth asked feeling something in her growl gravelly and scratch along her rib cage. 

“Family vacation,” Sam looked off when she said that as if there was more to it, “There was this girl. And I don’t know. I kinda felt like I had to have her. She was older than me. A lot older actually.”

“What’s a lot?” Beth wanted to know everything even though it made this dark monster inside her rage.

“Between five and six years.” Sam’s face had that sunburnt look again.

“And you were…”

“Fifteen.”

“Wow!”

“Yeah. But nothing beats a woman swooning on a midnight walk or shivering from soft, little touches.” She sighed somehow with a sultry edge then shook her head. “It was just for that summer though.”

“Sorry.” Except she wasn’t. Not even a little sorry to hear this girl was absent from Sam’s life by then.

“Don’t be,” Sam laughed, “Was two years ago. I’m over it.”

“Still sounds like it was nice.” Sam looked at her and then away again, “Was it really that special?”

“It was… It’s… hard to explain,” Sam said leaning towards her, “But just trust me, it’s… something.”

“Then I guess I can’t wait,” Beth replied and she kind of meant it. It sounded like something special and even though she found mushy stuff like that ridiculous and liable to cause puking, it still seemed like it would be nice. She felt her face go hot thinking about days of tickling and laying in bed together with a girlfriend. About them cuddling and kissing and not needing anything more in that moment. About laying naked together so they could touch everywhere there was skin. About the scent she’d leave behind on Beth’s covers. About her face lighting up whenever Beth gave her a seductive look. About her voice loudly calling out her name when her hands and mouth were busy exploring her soft, tiny body. Her laugh when she hit a particularly sensitive spot. Blonde hair in her face, blocking out a reality that didn’t exist as they were their own tiny world. Hazel eyes staring lovingly down at her as an overly sweet and happy voice whispered, ‘I love you, Beth.’ Thinking about it in that light, Beth found herself wondering how Chris and Ashley were able to spend even one moment out of each others’ beds.

Sam was making a face Beth was not able to decipher or describe. 

She was still smiling but her eyes looked- sad wasn’t the right word. Her eyes looked like she wanted to have made peace with something but she was unable to. Her eyes said that it was unfair. Beth felt like she’d made this face whenever Josh got the privilege of Jess’ laughter. One that said, ‘Yeah, this is my life and I’d give anything to change it’ but no matter how long she waited the opportunity to do so never arrived. Beth didn’t like it on her own face.

And she hated it on Sam’s.

\---

“What were you guys doing?” Hannah asked as Beth and Sam left the kitchen. She was coming down the stairs. 

Beth glanced over at Sam. Had they not told Hannah they were going outside to play soccer? Had she thought Sam had left already? That couldn't be possible, could it? She’d never forgotten about Hannah before then and neither had Sam. There was no way they didn’t tell her.

“Beth was showing me a little bit about soccer,” Sam explained holding up the ball with a smile and then she shook her head, “I’m awful.”

Hannah made an ‘Ah’ face. Because that explained it. Hannah didn’t like soccer. At least not playing it. She and Josh had come to all of her games, faces painted with giant foam fingers and everything. It was nice because their parents could hardly ever come. When they did come to see her play they got excited and waved and cheered when she scored. Mostly though it was Hannah and Josh who cheered her on. However soon Hannah’s face fell again as if something had occurred to her, “You’ve never asked me to show you how to play tennis.”

“Yeah.” Sam stretched the word out. Beth looked at her too possibly as confused as her sister. That was actually an interesting point. Sam didn’t like sports, by her own admission. Not official ones anyway. Her excuse of being uncoordinated was certainly not unfounded as Beth had learned but she’d known that Hannah played tennis way before she knew Beth played soccer. Why would she try her hand at this sport first and not the other one?

“I just don’t think I’d be very good at tennis,” Sam finally answered. She wasn’t any better at soccer than she would be at tennis though. Beth saw that first hand not an hour ago. Hannah had that face from the other night on again. Her ‘you are lying to me face.’ Beth could completely understand it this time. 

Because Sam was lying.

“I actually need to head out,” she said with a cough, “My aunts and uncles are coming over for dinner and they’ll be disappointed if they don’t get to see me every second they can. So I guess I will see you guys around. Probably tomorrow or something.”

Slowly Sam backed out pulling her bag higher on her shoulder and gentle tossing Beth her ball back. She looked like she wanted to run but knew that would be strange. She waved once at the door before she disappeared through it. The twins stood in an awkward silence. Beth had never seen Sam like this. From the look on Hannah’s face when she turned back around, she might have been very aware of what caused this behavior in Sam and whatever that was she was not happy about it. Her eyes were still mad and laced with sadness when she turned to look Beth’s way again. Not knowing what else to do there, Beth shrugged her own bag higher on her shoulder.

“I gotta shower,” she said happy to have an excuse to leave this moment. She headed upstairs passed her sister. When had life gotten so tense and confusing?

\---

Sam didn’t come over the next day. 

Or the next. Or the two after that. In fact their house was unusually quiet that week. (The dinner had not been a lie as Sam had texted Hannah a photo of her with her family.) Sam’s family adored Hannah and had apparently been disappointed she hadn’t joined them. But everything before it- 

Why would Sam think she had to lie about them hanging out? They of course had to lie when it came to their “covert mission.” (Sam wasn’t as funny as she thought she was.) But why was she worried about people knowing she was spending some time with Beth? It was innocent. What was the issue?

Something it seemed if Hannah was to be believed. Beth noticed it immediately. Once more her sister and subtle did not belong in the same sentence. Not without a phrase that denied the plausibility of the two meshing in anyway between them. Hannah, much like the rest of her family, was too dramatic to accomplish it.

“Hey,” Beth said as she entered the kitchen with Josh at her heels. She opened their large refrigerator. Hannah was at the counter with a smoothie. She almost glared at Beth when she entered. Though right after she shot Josh her loving little smile. Josh leaned his back on the counter by her because although he’d come along, of course he was not going to help get their food.

“Just warming up diner food from last night so we can pig out. We’re marathoning all of the Lord of the Rings movies.” Then Josh added with a suggestive smile, “You should hang with us. Wouldn't want to miss a chance to oogle that future husband of yours, right?”

Beth hated Lord of the Rings for too many reasons to count but as she was lying to Josh every day she figured she might as well suck it up and watch one of his and Hannah’s favorite movies. That was the least she owed him. Besides whether the movie was good or bad or anything in between the three of them always had fun during their movie nights. Hannah and Josh knew all the best lines from almost every movies they liked and they would always overshadow the actual actor when those lines came up. Beth had seen them do entire back and forths. She didn’t care about not being able to join in because half the time acting as if they were preforming it for her. It was nice.

“Thanks, Josh,” Hannah said her eyes flicking to Beth for a half second, “But I think just want to take a bath with a magazine and turn in early.”

Beth dropped the box of food on the counter and it almost tumble to the floor. She turned to see Josh making a face she assumed she was also making. Hannah was saying no… to movie night? None of the three of them ever, ever, said no to movie night, even if they were too sick to get out of bed they’d still drag their ass down. Any of the Washington siblings asking any of the other Washington siblings to join in on a movie night was barely a formality. They’d probably end up joining without being asked.

“Uh, um,” Josh didn’t know what to say to her but then neither did Beth. This had quite literally never happened before, “Really? Orlando will miss you.” 

“Yeah,” Hannah said with more attitude than Beth thought was possible for her as she gave her another dark half-glare, “I want to be alone tonight.”

Josh looked between his sisters. Josh, Beth hated to admit, might be the smartest of the three of them and he definitely knew both of them better than they knew him. If Beth saw it, and she did, then Josh was seeing it too. There was no other way to take what was happening. There was no other explanation. Hannah was mad at Beth. Not ‘you stained my cutest top’ mad or ‘you took the food I was saving’ mad. She was genuinely mad at her sister. In a way Beth wasn’t sure she seen in her life. What were she or he supposed to do in this situation. How does one handle a circumstance they would’ve never thought they might have to deal with? This was something totally new. New was bad far as she was concerned. Beth could not control new.

“You sure, sis?” Josh attempted one last time clearly at a loss.

“I’m sure.” Then Hannah picked up her glass and made her way out. She didn’t even look back to see if they were going to chase her down to soothe her. Whatever this was about it was really, really bad.

“What did you do?” Were of course the first words Josh said as soon as Hannah had been gone long enough for them to know she wasn’t in range of hearing them.

“Nothing.” She really hadn’t. She had a feeling she knew what Hannah thought she was doing though.

“Yeah, okay,” he scoffed, “I know Hannah gets upset over nothing, but she doesn’t get this upset over, you know, actually nothing.”

“How do you know she isn’t mad at you?” She knew it was a pathetic thing to say. Hannah could not have made it more clear she was mad at Beth.

“Because I’m her perfect angel of a brother.” she snorted. “And I didn’t get a ‘go burn in hell’ glare.”

“She’s probably just being paranoid,” Beth said turning away to load the food into the two microwaves they had, “It’s a trait you two share. I would think you’d recognize it.”

“Well, what’s she being paranoid about?” Josh asked. He hated when they fought. Even if it was a rare occurrence all the Washingtons hated when the other two were not getting along. Beth sighed while she turned to look at Josh. He always wanted every little detail. He wouldn’t be happy only knowing what Beth assumed Hannah was thinking. He was going to want to know why Hannah thought that.

“Sam and I have been hanging out without her a bit recently,” she told him hoping their food would be done soon and they could get to their movie. If he even wanted to watch it with her anymore. Josh gave her his signature ‘you’re holding out on me’ look and crossed his arms. He was leaning towards her off the counter this time.

“Why are you and Sam hanging out without her so much?”

“We have some things to talk about that are just between us.”

“What things?”

“Things.”

“Like what?”

‘Like how ridiculously cute Sam is when she’s cooing over the fact that your best friends are screwing each other behind your back.’

She wanted to say it. It hurt her that she couldn’t say it. Josh deserved to know. Too bad it was Chris who had to tell him. She could not do it to him. Hannah would move on. She’d understand eventually that Sam and Beth wanted her around. They weren’t avoiding her. Hurting Hannah was a by-product of having this secret. Beth was hurting Hannah by mistake and she could fix it. If she told Josh everything she knew then she would be hurting him intentionally. She would be actively choosing to hurt him and his friendships with Chris and Ashley. That was so much worse than doing it by accident with Sam.

“Josh, Hannah can be such a kid.” Beth finally found something to say. “Sometimes Sam and I want to talk about more mature things. That’s all.”

“Yeah?”

God, he deserved to know. “Yeah.”

The microwave beeped behind her. Josh came forward to help her take it all out.

“Okay then,” he said very obviously simply deciding to believe her, “Well, if Hannah isn’t gonna drool over Orlando someone has to. So let’s head into the cinema room to get comfy and I can gaze longingly at the man-meat I’m going to steal from her one day.”

Beth laughed. At least in all this mess she could always count on Josh for that.


	7. The Inmates Pt.1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Other people are the best part of it.

This whole situation must have made Beth delusional. It was the only explanation for how she thought for even one minute let alone a week that she would enjoy one of Josh and Hannah's parties. She was not having fun. As expected all of her friends were socializing with other friends she didn’t know and really didn’t want to get to know either. She would look for Sam and Hannah but it was impossible to keep up with them during these things. They were off on their next adventure seconds after they’d gone through the first. She-lions indeed. This might be the only environment where Hannah felt comfortable and Beth didn’t.

She wondered if she should sneak into her room. Maybe she’d get lucky and neither other Washington would notice she wasn’t around. Of course that meant going up to the bedrooms, including all of their guest rooms. Josh had jokingly(?) dubbed the area the ‘pleasure palace.’ That would be a fun way to spend her night, surrounded by strangers having loud, awkward, drunk sex in her house. Did she own anything she could transform it into a pair of earplugs? Probably not. Beth, unlike her older siblings, was not willing to brave the brothelway which was what Chris called it.

“Yo!” He’d showed up next to her as he was prone to do. He threw an arm around her shoulders the second he got to her and were she a weaker person she’d have collapsed as he’d put too much of his massive weight onto her, “My sister from another mister!”

“Hey, Chris,” she said with less happiness than she felt. Chris always made a point to track her down during these things so she wasn’t alone. He liked to make people smile and he saw Beth as the ultimate challenge in that department.

“Beth, Beth, Beth. You look upset.” Seriously did he know nothing about her after all these years? Everyone knew she hated these things. Who’d expect her to look happy? “Let’s fix that.”

He pulled her around the house and she could have stopped him. Chris’ size though meant people bent around him wherever he went giving him a clear path. She was happy to have these idiots backing away from her. These strangers had no way of knowing Beth was the grizzly and Chris was the teddy.

They’d made it most of the way through the house. Considering his love for pranks going anywhere with Chris was a dangerous endeavor. Beth complained. "Where are you dragging me off to?”

“I’ve got something to show you” he yelled excitably continuing to drag her. She had to laugh because whatever this was he was thrilled to show it off. He was happy which meant he had not gotten far in his drinking yet. Chris was an emotional drunk and he hit stages. She did not want to be around for sober enough to walk but drunk enough to be shouting everything. Slightly tipsy Chris was the most fun one.

“Chris,” she wanted to sound more annoyed. This guy was ruining her life. Yet she was so alone in this kind of environment and he was there. He was what she had. He was a good thing to have. Chris made people feel safe. No one made Beth feel safe. No one made Beth feel like she didn’t have to be scared. Even the people who should. Finally they made it to the dining room and she knew exactly where he was taking her and why. Sure enough he brought her to the very edge of their dinner table. He got her there before the crowd would assemble. The music faded out for a quarter-second before their speakers blasted with, ‘Hot in… So hot in herre… So hot in…’

Someone in their gang had put on a song from the list. Only one of them would have known to do it. Sure everyone knew they would do it at some point during the night. But only one of the ten would’ve known how to get it started. From his smile it was easy to guess who.

“Chris,” Beth yelled over the music as it picked up, “You are the man!”

“Shut up baby, I know it.” He pointed in front of them. Beth turned to see Sam pulling Hannah up via one of the chairs. Once on the surface Hannah laughed. She dropped her red solo cup as Sam led her to the center of the table. She should’ve been more concerned for their safety being the ‘responsible’ one. But this was too much fun. Besides they’d do it no matter what Beth said. They had done it before they made the switch from sugar to alcohol. It was the only part of this shit she enjoyed which Chris knew. They were ready to dance in time for the first verse of Nelly commanding they remove their clothes.

“Aw, yeah!” Chris yelled pulling Beth closer in his one-armed hug. The worst thing about the tipsy version of Chris was the physical attention he never gave sober.

Beth laughed though and pumping a first in the air gave her own, “Shake it ladies!”

They started dancing like they were partners as they went forward and back, literally let down their hair to whip one after the other, playfully shaking their booties at one another, pressed their back together and shimmied leaning one way then the other. There was loud whoops from the (mostly male) guests as people pushed toward the edges of the table to watch the girls. She and Chris were shifted forward as they gathered around. Who needed strippers when they had inebriated young girls sexy table dancing? With her longer limbs Hannah’s dancing had a more krumping style. Sam had a few more curves so she stuck closer booty dancing and twerking. They evened out in terms of sexiness. (For the rest of them. There was of course a clear winner in that race for Beth). While Hannah made quick turns with arms outstretched as if demanding attention, pop and locking and jutting her arms and legs in time with the music, Sam kept things more inward, running her hands through her hair and along her shapely body, wiggling her chest and shoulders in ways that made her hard not to look at. She’d twist her strong arms together over her head to run her little fingers along them before ruffling her hair roughly.

All of it came with these stops and starts and almost tripping as she moved far too much. Her flailing her arms out to steady herself as her little feet slid on the table’s glossy surface, slightly off-key cries of “I am getting so hot. I wanna take my clothes off” from them both. Hannah lifting her shirt up enough to show off her vibrating stomach and Sam erotically pulling her open blouse down toward her elbows.

A small part of Beth had a hard time believing this girl, who could roll her abdomen that smoothly and rock her hips which such ease, was the same girl who couldn’t kick a soccer ball right.

Sam and Hannah wandered to different sides of the table. More adjacent from one another than across. Beth saw Matt (poor boy) and Jess bobbing across from her by her sister and heard Chris laugh loudly when Jess actually pulled out a small stack of cash and tossed it onto the table at them.

Sam jut one hip out toward the crowd with an enticing jiggle catching Beth’s attention again. Too many boys to count erupted. Playing it up was more her thing than Hannah’s. Sam did same thing with her other hip to the other side as she backed her swaying body towards Beth, her body popping with every back step. Her blouse slipped down off her biceps exposing more skin. She was pale white but no one knew with her perpetual tan. Eventually Sam must’ve decided the garment was only hindering her in movement. She was probably hot too. Beth could sympathize with that as she was burning up like she had a bad fever. Sam began to clumsily pull it off bumping her hips side to side the whole time which was somewhat awkward but no less appealing. Once it was almost off, she leaned back toward Beth, bridging her back in a way that made the blood in Beth’s veins bubble with excitement. Sam saw Beth (upside-down), maybe for the first time, so close watching her. Close enough to see Sam’s exposed collarbone, neck and shoulders turn her sunburnt color. Ever the showman Sam spun to face that direction as she swung her shirt above her head in a way far more jovial than arousing. Though its lascivious natural was not remotely lost.

Chris put his fingers in his mouth and gave a loud whistle as he once more hugged Beth to him tight. Beth couldn’t help but smile at how into it he was in a much more innocent way than these other guys, he watched them with no (well barely any) lust in his eyes even as Sam dancing sexily literally right in front of him. Sam rolled her belly with eyes locked them (her?) and almost like they had practiced it…

“You’re with a winner so baby you can't lose!” Chris sounded ridiculous.

“I got secrets can't leave Cancun!” Beth was not any better.

But together they were even worse, “So take it off like your home alone. You know dance in front your mirror while you're on the phone. Checking your reflection and telling your best friend like ‘girl I think my butt getting big!’”

Sam punctuated it with a hard slap on her ass as she spun full circle. Far more free of restraint her breasts jiggled as she went down then bounced back up with a renewed fervor. It occurred to Beth that Sam’s chest was much larger than she’d previously thought. Beth was embarrassed that she was only able to force her eyes away from Sam’s boobs when some asshole bumped right into her from behind. Chris looked back, keeping his hand on her shoulder like he was afraid to release her. A conversation began between the two guys but Sam had lost none of her attention.

She grabbed her hands over her head and twirled them as she did the same with her body in order to do another complete turn. Beth caught sight of her face. Her eyes were closed tightly lost in how much fun she was having. She was biting her lip in a way Beth imagined someone who was experiencing a great amount of pleasure might do so. Sam continued spinning, shaking her hips, swinging her arms with her feet stumbling a little bit. And then a lot a bit. Her eyes popped open and her hands came flailing out.

“Beth!” “Chris!” Sam and Beth called out at the same time. Chris turned just in time to support most of Beth’s weight as she fell back into him being knocked over herself by the weight of a falling Sam.

She’d slipped on her discarded shirt and fell forward. Her arms reached for the nearest thing to use to steady herself which is how they ended up hooking around Beth’s neck. Sam’s legs had sprawled out strangely against the table as her tiny body was (mostly) caught by Beth. Her hands had grabbed onto two awkward places on Sam’s body, one due to the angle and the other due to location. Yep, definitely bigger than Beth had guessed.

Sam was warm and wet from activity. Her skin glistened in the flashing lights. Her face had found it’s way between Beth’s neck and shoulder. Her breath came out in heavy pants from both the exertion of her dancing and the fear when she fell. Her hair was in Beth’s face. Their bodies connected in too many places to be sure of them all. She smelled like apple spice and red wine and sweat which mingled with the scent of the dozens of people around them bringing more attention to just how much hers stood out. Beth’s eyes stayed on Sam’s shoulder blades. She could see a line on her back where the light changed on her skin as it shifted in tone from white to tan.

Someone spoke. As in directly to Beth. She missed it as Sam leaned back and they were eye to eye. Amber flakes and all. What colors did Sam see in her eyes? She hoped it was more than moss brown. Like shiny topaz or sweetened coffee. If she was lucky maybe creamy milk chocolate.

Sam smiled and pushed off her shoulders to slide back onto her knees and still looking at Beth pushed herself onto her feet and danced her way up to standing to the sound of cheering. Beth felt her face soften quite a bit as Sam began to move again. It was hard to believe the same song was still playing, maybe it had been long enough that it looped back around. Certainly felt it. As she danced this time Beth felt like this had all been just for her. That as far as Sam was concerned dozens of drooling boys meant nothing compared to her gaze. Her whole body was lit up with that sunburnt color. They only broke eye contact when Sam closed her eyes tightly to roughly ruffle her hair near the end of the song.

Once over Hannah pulled Sam to the center, pushing each other playfully waiting for the next song. Sam’s eyes kept traveling to Beth who likewise couldn’t move her focus out of their charged moment. When the music picked up Beth knew this one would also be just for her. She felt a bit shy and so she looked sideways quickly only to see Chris had left. When did he let go of her? How did she not notice?

“Chris!” she called looking for him and then back at the little ‘stage,’ at Sam. In her search Beth was eventually shoved out of her spot against the table by horny teenage boys. Pfft as if these drunk losers had any chance with the very sexy but also very gay Sam. Looking back one more time Beth pushed through the throng of people in her attempt to find her party pal. A row of douche bags was blocking the show so the best part of the night (for Beth at least) had ended.

Beth wandered back through the house this time being bumped and smacked into as she was back to her thin self and not being led around by her literal gentle giant. She finally located Chris, being the one who was dragged along this time. He’d been pulled away by her brother, who was laughing loud. From as far away as she was she could not tell whether Chris had gone with him willingly or not.

A group was gathering by the time Beth made to them. A large table with red solo cups in the shape of a pyramid was in front of the bar. Chris was pushing people back as he made a line with duct-tape a few feet away from the set-up (that was going to be fun to get off the carpet). It looked like another of Josh’s ridiculous, made-up-on-the-spot drinking games which he’d forced Chris into helping him with. She failed at not being upset her brother had stolen the only person who wanted to hang out with her. She was even more upset when she saw Josh helping Jess up onto the bar to sit with five other people.

Josh climbed up to dangerously stand on one of the bar stools, “Hello my adoring fans! Who wants a body shot?” The people around her cheered. “Well then you gotta earn it!”

“You see before you a pyramid of sorts. One level for each of our lovely volunteers. You get your ball in without stepping over the line and you get to have yourself a taste of someone’s tight bod. We’ve got a fine looking one, five and ten, a sexy twenty-five and fifty and finally this smoking hot one-hundred. Good luck, ya filthy degenerates!”

He’d pointed to them each in turn when he ‘introduced’ them. They were pulling off their shirts to let Chris write their numbers on their stomachs. Did this count as prostitution? It should. Chris handed the marker off to Josh when he got to Jess making an ‘ew’ face and looking away as she stripped down to her bra to let Josh write a one and two zeros on her abs. Jess was the prize for getting the hardest shot. She’d probably insisted she wouldn’t play unless she was the top prize. The guy marked one had to be quite the fuckboy so Beth was surprised to see it wasn’t Mike. Another surprise was Matt generously taking the twenty-five point spot. Wait hadn’t he just been across from her in the dining room?

Beth looked along the line. She didn’t know the other four people. She’d been right about the one being a guy though. Each of them was attractive so you weren’t really losing no matter who it was you won. (Seriously, this was so fucking perverted!) If you got your ball in you got to lick somebody somewhere. Beth hoped it was the ‘reward’ who got to choose that part.

Josh set out the salt and citrus fruit as a guy went up to the line and Chris handed him two balls from a plastic jar full of them. That was all you got until you circled back to the end of the line to try again. Two balls. Two shots. Two chances. But you only had to make one. Beth looked over at the pyramid. Ten cups. Seven cups. Five cups. Three cups. Two cups. One cup. Jess was worth a hundred points so she only had one cup at the top of the pyramid. What were the odds of Beth getting one ball into that one cup? Did she want to risk it?

These idiots didn’t seem to have a chance. They stepped up, aimed and it bounced of the rim. A few of the balls flew back down and landed in the lower cups. Some people simply played it safe, tossing their balls at the tens, fives and ones. There was quite a lot of body licking. Matt had only had one guy lick his forearm so far. The fifty was being scored more than he was due to all the guys who were aiming for the one-hundred. Beth didn’t have terrible aim but she wasn’t an expert shot like Chris or Mike was. Either guy would sink both their ping pong balls into that top cup with little effort. Beth doubted Chris would try scoring it given the whole blended family situation with the Rileys. She also doubted Ashley would approve of Chris’ tongue on any body other than theirs. Ew. Beth, why?

Mike tied with Chris for best shot in their group. He’d only need one ball. First shot. If he went for it, he’d get it. Even though it wasn’t like Jess would be unavailable if Mike got her before all the others, Beth could still try. She wanted to be the first one however. No on had gotten a ball in her cup thus far. Mike was not on line yet either. In fact he was nowhere in sight. All she had to do was join the group and wait for a chance. She’d get to have Jess in a way Josh never had. Maybe never would.

She could see the action much better in line. She was tall so she caught most of it until a guy bigger would step in her line of sight. She was forced to move over. She needed to keep her eyes on Jess. There were cheers whenever somebody did a shot. Chris had joyously shouted ‘over the line’ to the sound of booing more than once, relishing his power in this game. He’d apparently come around and that stung a tiny bit. He was clearly having more fun with Josh than he’d been having with Beth.

“Elizabeth!” Beth turned around quickly but tried not to lose sight of the game. Sam and Hannah came into view. Hannah threw an arm around her. Sam leaned on Hannah after a moment, blushing deeply.

Beth decided to skip over that one of them had used her given name. It was probably said to annoy her. Sam was still just in her tight camisole with her skin still shiny and sunburnt. She wanted to teasingly ask her what had happened to her blouse. But she didn’t feel like they could talk directly after what had happened earlier. Sam seemed to feel the same way as she simply relied on Hannah in a way Beth had never seen. It looked like her sister would be getting all the attention. “Hey. What are you two doing?”

“Trying to see what’s going on,” Hannah said using her twin as a support to lean up and over the heads in front of them. The trio was pushed forward steadily. There was no luck with the highest point cup.

“Done with your dancing then?” Beth’s throat felt like it closed right after.

“For now,” Hannah giggled then she jostled Sam, “Sammy was slipping around too much to keep up.”

Beth coughed loudly as she wondered whether Hannah had seen Sam fall. Beth catch her. She wasn’t acting like she had. Sam would not make eye contact with her although Beth saw she had a small smile peaking through her hair. Sam swayed with a pure and genuine happiness that she could appreciate.

“It’s one of Josh’s games,” Beth answered bringing things back to the topic. The crowd was clearing out ahead of her. Sam snorted a laugh when the set-up came into their view. Beth shrugged Hannah off to step forward once there was no one in front of her. Chris was rolling two ping pong balls in his large hand like baoding balls as she approached. He gave her a devil’s smile, despite also looking surprised, as if happy to see she’d made her way back to him and intrigued with the how. She held her hand out-

“Ehn.” Josh, sitting at the bar cutting lemons, made a sound like a buzzer, “Little sisters can’t play.”

“My little sister is playing,” Chris reminded him indicating Jess. Still rolling his ping pong balls.

“Your sister’s a hot piece of ass anyone here would tear in two, right?” They all whooped in agreement.

“I think they’d say the same of yours, yeah?” drunk cheers of agreement (no sober man would chance it with Josh there), “I know I would.”

The hell? What was the bad blood there? Chris wouldn’t ever dare say something like that about her or Hannah in front of Josh. Or rather Beth had thought. But Chris had looked right at Josh and implied he would have sex with her or Hannah if given the opportunity. She knew he didn’t mean it. He was trying to get under Josh’s skin and she had a feeling it had nothing to do with Josh implying the same of Jess.

“Well then virgins can’t play,” Josh corrected.

“Is that why you’re not playing?”

“No but it’s sure as hell why you aren’t.”

Their tones were still light, but Josh had gotten more violent with his cutting and Chris was squeezing those those spheres in his hand so hard he might crush them.

Had Beth not known them as well as she did she would’ve thought they were just two buddies trying to one-up each other for shits and giggles. But she did know them well. This was not their run-of-the-mill casual and friendly ball busting. If it was there’s no way in hell they would have strayed onto this topic. Some stuff was off-limits, even for best friends.

“Hey now, come on, guys.” Peacekeeper Matt to the rescue in a mirthful tone. “Enough. Let’s get back to the game, huh?”

He directed that at the crowd and they cheered. Josh looked over with shifty eyes and leaned back on the bar. Chris however smirked, satisfied with his victory thanks to an assist from Matt. Beth suspected as Sam and Hannah had accidentally found their way into the line that Matt had an ulterior motive for trying to start the game back up. Speaking of, a drunk Hannah raced in front of Beth in her excitement even though she’d had no intention of playing until that very moment. This caused Sam to slip off and onto Beth’s back instead. She giggled softly. Again Beth felt that surge of adrenaline pump through her stiffening limbs. They locked eyes for half a moment before Sam turned her focus back to Hannah.

“Go, Hannah!” Sam cried right next to Beth’s shoulder as she clumsily thrust her fist up into the air. Beth almost couldn’t keep watch on the game with Sam bouncing around in support of her best friend. She smiled and rolled her eyes forcing her gaze over to the events occurring. Hannah wasn’t going to go for Jess. Her overly competitive but also definitely straight sister was most likely going to aim for…

“Twenty-five points!” Chris sounded the happiest he had so far to announce a win as the people there made sounds of congratulations. Josh was trying to hide a scowl from his revulsion and anger. He was good at it. She was trained enough in his expressions to see it however. Chris knew it was there as well. He knew Josh enough to know this was not okay with him. Hannah was oblivious while she dashed up to grab one of the fruit slices and a shot was reluctantly handed to her from Josh. Matt had the biggest smile Beth had ever seen as Hannah headed his way and she gave him her slice to put in his mouth as he rubbed salt on his neck. There was an explosive cheer as she held her shot up for all to see before she licked the salt of off Matt, downed it and bit the lemon out of his mouth, a dreamy look on his face.

“She must be the most blind girl in the world,” Beth laughed to Sam.

Sam still looked loopy as she asked, “What do you mean?”

Beth stepped forward for her turn, “I mean Matt looks he’s ready to shove his tongue down her throat along with that lemon but she’s so hyper focused on Mike she can’t see that he’s half-in love with her.”

“Yeah? So it’s just a common fucking trait in your family then, huh?” Sam yelled directly at Beth when she said it, her face red for a different reason. She stared angrily at Beth for one more moment before she grabbed Hannah’s hand, who had wandered back over to the two of them, and dragged her out of the room. Hannah went with her without a fight giggling on her way out, waving over to Matt because he was waving at her. Beth followed the two girls with her eyes until they disappeared, struggling to figure out why Sam was mad. They’d been smiling and laughing together just before. What changed?

She spent too much time thinking on it. There were still six half-naked hotties up on the bar willing to let their fit bodies be licked. No one wanted to risk another Washington holding them up. She was pushed out of the line by none other than Michael Munroe. He’d finally shown up to join in on the fun. He moved into her spot to take his ping pong balls from a guy who was not Chris (he would’ve made sure she had gotten her turn).

She found him standing over by the bar with her brother. They were arguing quietly. Up until Josh pointed at Chris almost threateningly and his friend stormed off.

“Yo, Josh,” Mike called before he threw his ball bringing his and Beth’s attention back to the game, “Bet you a hundred bucks I make the hundred in one shot”

Josh laughed and his impish smile was back on, “I will take that bet, Munroe! I’ve got money to lose.”

Jess also laughed and cheered, “Let’s go, Mikey!”

“This one’s just for you, little hottie.” And like a true charmer he winked at her.

Beth sighed, turning from the game and making her way out. There was no point in her watching this. Mike was going to make it. Mike was going to win. Mike was going to be the first person to win Jess. She wasn’t sure where to go when she got to the door. Four of her friends, three of which she didn’t want to be around at the moment, were involved in that stupid game behind her. (Oh goody, cheering. Mike had won as expected.) Chris seemed to have moved onto his angry drunk stage so she didn’t want to hang out with him anymore. Sam and Hannah were out as she’d somehow managed to get on Sam's shit-list. Was it the fall? She’d seemed fine while Hannah was playing the game. So it was Em or Ash.

Actually she hadn’t seen Ashley all night. That was weird. Even before this headache started they could usually be found around Chris. Maybe they hadn’t come at all. Maybe that was the source of Chris and Josh fighting. Was it possible his best friends’ rendezvouses had finally come to light? If so that was not a place Beth was ready to go. She was going to avoid any more involvement in that mess as long as she could.

She spotted Emily by the stairway and headed toward her. A gaggle of guys were around her naturally. Unfortunately Emily was quite the catch and as soon as one set of prospects left, another suitor ran up to her. He knocked into Beth hard enough to make her stumble. Emily reached out and grabbed her to keep her on her feet. It was not Beth’s night. Once she was steady, Emily’s eyes snapped to the attacker.

“Don’t you know how to walk straight, stupid!? Or does breathing at the same time make it too hard for you to concentrate on your feet?!”

The guy looked about to argue back but Beth had decided to focus on the her stained shirt rather than the dick who bumped into her. Emily got this impression as Beth motioned away from the guy who had failed to woo her friend. Emily shot one last nasty look his way as they left him behind heading to the bottom of the staircase.

“Do you need help, Beth?” Emily’s voice had gone soft. She was sweet underneath all that edge.

“It’s okay, Em,” she said examining her shirt, “I’m just gonna go put on a different shirt.”

“You want company?”

She didn’t.

She hadn’t decided if she was coming back once she was in her room. She shook her head. She turned away from Emily and she didn’t wait for her to say anything. She just wanted out of there.

That was the real problem with these things. She always ended up alone. Her friends were off doing stuff she didn’t want to do with people she didn’t want to be around. She mostly tried to keep to herself. This is what happened when she tried to join in. She wasn’t the star Josh and Hannah were with crowds cheering for them. Beth was totally and completely invisible. So she’d convinced herself she wanted it this way, she was happier this way. Then nights like that night would happen and she’d remember what a lie that was.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Confession I do not have the next chapter done. Honestly I think what I need to keep going is some feedback from those of you reading it. If you would oblige me that would be appreciated. Also two chapters at once. See how I spoil you all.


	8. The Inmates Pt.2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Other people are the worst part of it.

Beth made it through the hall of sounds she’d rather not have heard to get to her room. There was an emergency hole in her doorknob. It was meant for getting in when it was accidentally locked as the occupant left. Beth used it on purpose to make sure no one got into her room during this kind of shit. She pulled a small nail out from her pocket and pushed it into the hole. She closed and locked her door the second after she was through it. She pulled her shirt off and sat by her closet door unsure what to do as her anxiety took hold of her. She felt like hiding out the rest of the night and crying through her pain.

A noise of frustration from outside made her look at her windows. One of them was open. Sounded as if its maker felt much the same way as Beth. There was a tiny veranda just outside she could climb to if she wanted. There were not a lot of people who hung out there during house parties. It was too close to the myriad of sex noises and too far from the music and booze to be enjoyed. Still she didn’t like the idea of someone being able to get into her room on the off chance they wanted to. She crawled over to the window to reach up and close it. She saw the source of the sound leaning on the railing just outside.

Ashley. They were looking off the edge. They weren’t crying. They weren’t laughing. They weren’t wobbling around drunk. Maybe they were thinking. Beth wouldn’t want her space intruded if she had on the face they did. She quietly as possible went back to pulling down her window, eyes lingering on Ashley as she did so. Wildly she felt maybe she should go talk to them. Then a large frame leaned next to them against the railing not long after she thought it. Beth dropped down to kneel not really sure why she did it. There wasn’t enough light to be sure but Beth had a strong hunch as to who the figure was.

“Hi, pretty.” Yep, Chris. Well, mystery of where he had stormed off to solved. 

“Hi, Chris.” Beth saw him clumsily shifting until his chest was pressed right up against Ashley’s back. He hugged them to him, arms right below their breasts, burying his face into their hair as he did.

“Mmm, you’re so pretty.” She heard Chris half-moan and half-whine moving his mouth down closer to Ashley’s ear.

“And you’re pretty drunk.” They twisted as best as they could, while against the railing and trapped in what looked like a tight grip until they were face to face. Chris’ hands shifted, one just above their butt and the other one on the middle of their back, still pressing them against him forcefully. They ran their hands along his biceps and shoulders before curving them around his neck.

“Yeah but you turn me on when I’m not drunk.” Beth had never seen Chris act like this but then when would she have seen him in a situation like this one. She’d think that was the case if Ashley didn’t also look a little thrown off by it.

Still they laughed and they let Chris crush them against the railing to kiss them. Beth had been right. The two of them kissing looked sweet albeit also a bit silly. Soon though Chris moved their kissing from innocent to passionate. His fingers curled into claws. Ashley did not look entirely comfortable with that but they did seem to be enjoying it based on the sounds they made.

She should go but she didn’t move. She had become so invested in them, had become so invested in their relationship. She couldn’t bring herself to leave, not out of desire or interest (this was the last thing she wanted to witness). It was just that something seemed off. She sat by her window as quietly as she could and watched as whatever was going to happen unfolded.

Chris backed off suddenly much to Beth’s and apparently Ashley’s surprise, “Hey, let’s go downstairs. You missed Sam and Hannah’s show. But the comeback tour is probably being booked as we speak.”

Ashley pushed him back even further, “I can not believe you.”

“We can’t do this. I shouldn’t have even come out here.”

“But you did.”

“And I shouldn’t have!”

“Do you seriously think you’re the one who has the right be mad when you were trying to seduce me?”

“We talked about this.”

“I didn’t do anything. You did!”

“I know!” Chris ran his hands through his hair roughly. “But I’m not doing this in Josh’s house.”

“You want to though,” Ashley accused and Chris didn’t deny it, “And I’m guessing it’s not cause you just can’t keep your hands off me another minute either.”

“He would. He wouldn’t think twice about screwing you in my house. Hell, he’d fuck you in my bed.”

“Why’d you stop then? You wanna fuck me in Josh’s bed then fuck me in Josh’s bed.” Ashley sounded angry and annoyed and frustrated. “If you want to do it so badly, do it. Or did you just want to tempt yourself a tiny bit so you could feel good about taking the high road? So you could feel like you did the right thing? That you’re a better man than Josh is?”

“I’m not a bad person.”

“Yeah? Does that ease your guilt, Chris?” Ashley sounded soft for half a moment.

“It’s not fair to him. We’re- Fuck! This is wrong.” Did he mean this right then or did he mean all of it?

“Right. Because you suddenly have a fucking conscience about us.” They sounded like they might cry, shaking in frustration. He wouldn’t look at them until they got right in his face, “Because you suddenly feel bad about how you’ve been treating him the last six weeks while we’ve been- whatever we are!”

Chris turned his back on Ashley and gripped the railing hard enough Beth was sure he was going to bruise his palms. “I don’t like doing this.”

“You didn’t feel that way yesterday.”

He still would not look at them, “Don’t go there!”

“Yeah, I figured this wasn’t really about Josh.”

“It is about Josh!” Chris insisted.

“You keep telling yourself that,” Ashley spat, “And you keep pretending that you’re a bigger person than I am because you’ve decided what’s happening between us is wrong. That we’re wrong because you feel guilty. And you know what? You should! Josh isn’t the only one you’re treating like crap!”

There was a long silence in the conversation (or the argument) surrounded by the inappropriate noises of the party. Then in a quiet voice they called to him kindly, sounding like they felt bad, “Look, Chris-”

“Go away.”

“Chris-”

“I said, ‘go away,’ so go.”

“Fine.” Ashley literally ran off after. 

Chris was bent over the railing and looked like he was going to cry or puke. He had made it clear he wanted to be alone though so Beth decided not to push it. She also didn’t want him to know she’d been there for such a private moment between the couple. She crawled back to her dresser and pulled out a shirt to wear before she left. She almost didn’t remember to lock the door. The good part of all this was she was too distracted to notice the sounds of strangers having sex. She moved on autopilot unsure how to process what had happened. She couldn’t work through it with anyone. She still had a secret to keep.

No wait. There was one person she could figure this out with.

Luckily Beth found Sam against the wall by one of the bathroom. Hannah and Sam were usually glued together during things like this so her sister was probably in there. She had no drink and was bobbing her head in time to the music. Beth slid through the crowd trying to get there before Hannah came out.

“Hey,” she called when she’d made it to Sam. She looked at her, rolled her eyes then turned to lean on her shoulder against the wall. Seriously what was her deal? 

“Yeah?” She sounded bored. She turned her gaze off to the side as if to avoid looking at her. Beth tried to shrug it off. Maybe she was just cranky and being drunk made it worse.

“I just saw Chris and Ashley,” Beth continued and for the first time ever Sam did not look at all happy to hear about that.

“Oh, yeah?!” she asked again pushing off the wall and moving with purpose into Beth's space, “Was he petting their hair because they were upset or cuddling up next to them in one chair? Were they laughing together about something silly? Were they having a flirty little bit of competition? Were they trying to impress each other with cool tricks or dancing or playing a stupid game they don’t even like? Was he holding them tightly because he was afraid they might fall? Were they staring into each others’ eyes with their face full of affection, an inch away from kissing? Was one of them leading the other on with compliments about how beautiful they are?! Was one of them completely ignoring the thousands upon thousands of obvious hints they were being given?!”

She spoke fast and forcefully, Beth couldn’t even get a word in. She shook her head, forgetting why she’d wanted to talk to Sam. They hung in an atmosphere of awful music and drunk bodies. Then Sam grabbed Beth’s biceps desperately. She felt herself being pulled forward until-

Beth had never kissed someone so much shorter than her before then so she didn’t know where to put her hands. She settled on Sam’s own biceps and pulled her even closer up onto her toes. Sam fell back against the wall beside them, flipping Beth over. For all the force behind it she expected this kiss to be much rougher but Sam surprised her once more with gentle lips. Her body pulsed with a familiar heat. One she’d felt for a very long time. All at once it made so much sense. This made sense. It was the gift she wasn’t quite aware she’d craved forever. She’d known it was going to happen, had been expecting it to happen. This was inevitable. Somehow Beth was sure it was and it would always remain the best kiss of her life.

Sam fell back down onto her heels slowly. Beth opened her eyes to see Sam’s bouncing along her face. She stepped out of Beth’s grasp and hit the wall. Her hands went to her mouth as she shook her head. Beth reached for her trying to let her know that this was okay. It was better than okay. It was perfect. Her head was much lighter and she was even more overwhelmed but that did not make any of this bad.

“Hey, Sammy.” Came from their side.

Sam looked at Hannah then back at Beth, eyes somehow widening even more. The next second blonde hair was disappearing into the crowd. As if it registered for both sisters at once they lightly knocked heads as they pushed into the horde after her. Being drunk, Hannah stumbled behind Beth as they ran.

“Sam!” They called either together or one right after the other as they shoved guests out of their way. They were both tall but Sam was too short. Even if the twins could see over most heads Sam was lost in the mob. Beth saw Hannah, probably unknowingly, use the shoulders of people to push herself higher to gain a better view. They slipped and slid over abandoned cups and bottles. 

Beth saw Josh on the stairs and heard him call, “Oh hi, Sammy. Oh uh, bye, Sammy.” 

Unsure whether Hannah had heard it too, Beth shoved harder through the crowd to get up to her brother leaning on the banister. She felt Hannah bump into her so she must be following Beth’s lead as they looked for her best friend. Josh squinted his eyes down at his little sisters before asking, “What’s up?”

“Josh!” Beth asked hearing she was out of breath. Hannah was using Beth as leverage this time to see better over the crowd. “Where did Sam go?”

Josh looked taken aback when he waved is beer bottle forward, “She’s at the front door with Ash.”

Neither bothered with a ‘thank you’ before they were off again this time with their destination in mind. They arrived at the door soon enough but their friends were not there. The sisters looked around for any sign of where the two might’ve gone. Then it became obvious to Beth and she called to Hannah as she rushed that way, “Outside! Outside!”

The two bulldozed onto the deck and looked around. No Ashley. No Sam. Same with the driveway. Then two lights appeared in the darkness. They moved towards Beth for a moment then disappeared turning their shine onto the asphalt. Red lights blinked for a second after. Sam’s car! Sam was getting Ashley to drive her home. She was leaving. Hannah supported herself on a deck chair clearly not able to do any of this anymore. Beth however leaped off the steps as she continued the chase. She followed the lights down the driveway for as long as she could. She was still so far away when they faded into the night as the car turned onto the road and left her behind.

Sam was gone.

Hannah tried to say something but Beth ignored her slamming the front door shut. She went right for the stairs even less interested in this mess than she’d been previously. Josh was still there. He’d been joined by Jess who giggled at everything he had to say. Beth took the steps two at a time until a small hand stopped her. She turned to see Jess had grabbed her. 

“Hey Beth, where are you headed?” She was giving her a quizzical look. She glanced up the staircase as if looking for someone. People didn’t normally go up to the third floor alone. Beth couldn’t give less of a shit about the sounds and smells of strangers fucking all around her room. She wanted out of there.

“Nowhere.” What was she doing? Beth had Jessica Riley’s attention while Josh was right beside her. She was even rubbing her arm. This never happened. It was a monumental moment. Yet the fire inside her chest merely flashed for a moment then it died down. It felt as if the last of the wood was crumbling into ash and there was no kindling left. But then what was a campfire when compared to a wildfire? 

“You okay?” She asked. Her hands were smooth and soft. Her touch was light and gentle. It felt wrong. It was wrong. Jess’ touch was wrong. Jess’ hand was wrong. Jess was wrong. Beth yanked away.

“Fine.” Beth was off again not giving Jess time to respond. She only barely noticed it when Josh slung an arm around the blonde to pull her attention toward something. She noticed it and felt almost nothing. The beast stirred but didn’t roar. It thrashed when a whirlwind summer filled with lust was revealed. She was so stupid! She was so angry but she tried not to slam her door. Did she want to cry? Did she want to scream? Would it help? Would anything? Who knew? She didn’t. She didn’t know anything. 

“Fuck!”

“Yeah, that about sums it up.” She jumped and flattened her back against her door. She looked around terrified by the voice. Chris was sitting by the foot of her bed. He gestured to her window. “You should keep those locked. Especially when the whole school is at your house. Someone might try to break in.”

He laughed as if it was the best joke he’d ever told. His head fell back onto her bed. She looked over at the window. He’d closed and locked it at least. He reached around the side of her bed she couldn’t see and shifted something into her sight. It was a box meant for holding beer. He set it at his feet before he pulled two bottles out and held one out toward her. Beth took what he was offering then she sat on her bed near his head. She popped the top off and took a very long swig.

“Whoa, the night must’ve been real rough on you too,” he laughed then pointed to the box, “I brought this for you. That’s why I’m in your room. I wanted to give it to you. I just- I don’t know, I wanted to do something for you. I really wanted you to have fun tonight. So even though I fucking hate weak ass chick beer, I know how much you love it so I bought it.”

“Chris!” she hissed even though they were basically alone and the perverts around them couldn’t care less about what they were talking about. Still people could not know Beth couldn’t handle hard liquor. She only drunk enough of it to look like she could when their clique hung out. Josh and Hannah didn’t even know she only drank low alcohol content beer. Chris only knew because he’d found some hidden in the basement fridge and asked which loser drank ‘baby’s first beer.’ Beth had turned bright red and he’d burst out in laughter.

He took a long drink himself and then made a grossed out face. She laughed at him as he took another. She didn’t get a chance to comment before he moaned out, “I could never get trashed off this shit.”

This was true. Chris’ immense size made him a tank. He hovered around drunk for a very long time before his brain finally gave up and shut things down. His liver was probably thankful when it did.

“You know you don’t have to drink it?” she said. 

“Nah, I do,” he said, “Penance.”

“Chris-” He interrupted her waving his hand awkwardly at her.

“You know if I ever had a sister I’d want her to be just like you. You’re a good sister.”

Beth didn’t bother to correct him that technically he did have a sister. She felt like that wasn’t the point of what he said. Besides that she did not want to think about Jess anymore.

“Well, not just like you. You can be quite the bitch when you’re grumpy, which is like all the time.”

“You know I could kick your ass, right?”

“You could but you won’t.”

“What makes you so sure?” Her tone was light but his dropped off.

“Cause you’re a good person. A good person caught in a bad situation. My bad situation.”

Oh. His penance. He looked sad as he swirled the liquid around in his bottle. She hadn’t thought much about Chris and Ashley when it came to Josh. Okay no she had done so a lot but not in the way she felt forced to at that moment. Chris looked so tired and defeated. She wondered for the first time what he thought of himself for doing this to Josh. It didn’t look like it was good. His guilt was in every weak and tired line on his face. His eyes were full of fear and it was the first time Beth realized that maybe Chris’ silence was not just for his own sake. That maybe everything he’d said was truthful. That he had no more desire to hurt Josh than she did. This wasn’t fun for him. But feelings weren’t something you could control. That’s why Sam’s face was always so full of life. She had too many feelings.

Sam… 

It sucked to realize you’d been hurting someone important. Someone you cared deeply about. She felt bad for herself. She felt worse for him. He’d never wanted her to be a part of that. So who was Beth to judge Chris? Really?

“I’m not a good person.”

“Chris-” she tried again.

“No matter what I do someone is gonna get hurt,” he sighed and took another long drink, “Telling Josh would hurt him. Ending things would hurt Ash. But I can’t do this and stay quiet anymore. I have to tell or I have to stop.”

“Which would hurt you?”

He breathed in deeply. “Both.”

Beth shook her head as Chris finished his beer with his same ‘God, I hate this’ face, “Chris what makes you so sure Josh will take it badly. I mean maybe he’s sincere about you and Ashley.”

“I’m not sure he’ll take it badly,” Chris said. He took out another two beers and passed one to her even though she wasn’t quite done with hers. He popped his open and set back to drinking. She downed the rest of her first then popped the top off her second. “In fact I’m absolutely sure he’ll be thrilled to hear that I’ve been banging Ash on the regular.”

Beth made a face and Chris smiled sadly, “But what Ashley and I have is so much more than that, Beth. We don’t just have sex.”

Beth snorted from laughter and her beer leaked from her mouth a bit. “Could’ve fooled me.”

“Okay fine, we certainly have sex a lot. But that’s because neither of us have ever had sex before or done the relationship thing so it’s exciting. Feelings can be hard to control.” He turned a very dark red. “It’s difficult to explain what being with someone that intimately for the first time is like. You really just have to experience it for yourself before it makes any sense.”

Huh. Where had she heard that before?

“We were friends for a long time. But,” He looked like he was searching. “Everything felt different. Like I’d never noticed how they push their hair over one ear then the other instead of at the same time. That they only smile with all of their teeth when they are either really happy or really nervous. It looks so stupid but it’s also so fucking cute. They can twitch their nose like bunny. Their skin bruises easy.”

Okay that one was weird until he gave her a telling look. Oh. Beth took a long drink. Well, their sex life was gross again.

“We talk on the phone for hours every night. Sometimes we sneak off just so we can hang out together or listen to music or go to the coffee shop on open mic night. Little stuff… that doesn’t look suspicious. And our first date, our only real date, was perfect. We didn’t even have sex when we got to my place.”

“Really?”

“Well no, we did eventually. But not right away and not that much. Actually we enjoyed each others’ company in more of a PG-13 kinda way most of that weekend. We slept in the same bed and it was so amazing to wake up with Ashley cuddled up against me.”

Chris breathed out a small laugh then sighed heavily, “I don’t know if he’ll like those parts of it.”

Beth took a long sip. They drank in relative silence after that. Chris made a noise of distaste every few moments between sips. She wanted to tell him he didn’t have to keep drinking it but knew it would do no good. She knew herself so by extension she knew Chris. She knew he felt he deserved punishment.

So instead she offered, “You can sit on my bed, Chris. I don’t think you have cooties anymore.”

“Hey,” Chris said as he climbed up awkwardly to sit by her. She enjoyed the way her bed rocked from his weight being added, “I had super cooties, remember? Cause I was a trans boy.”

“Right, sorry about that.”

“Should be, you transphobic little shit.”

“I was eight, Chris,” Beth defended, “And my only role models were the king and queen of tolerance, Bob and Melinda Washington.”

“And that resentment is why you bang ladies.”

“Uh yeah. Why do you bang ladies?”

“I have never banged a lady in my life.”

“Makes two of us.”

“You could have. She’s here all the time and I’m sure she and Hannah had twice as many sleep-overs as Josh and I did.” Chris had seen it. Chris had seen it before Beth had. Of course he did. Mirrors can’t lie.

Chris and her each finished another beer and he got them two more. Beth downed almost half of it and coughed loudly then she sighed and looked over at Chris to see he was still downing his, it might have been empty after he stopped.

“You knew.” He looked her way confused.

“Huh?”

“About Sam,” she explained, “You knew.”

He covered his mouth as if he could take back the words he had said. He probably would not have mentioned Sam were his body not fifty percent alcohol. Possibly seventy-five percent. He shrugged as an apology but Beth waved him off.

“I know, Chris,” she reassured, “Took me about two hundred years but I know now.”

“Yeah, I know the feeling.”

“And that’s how you knew.”

“I suspected maybe. You never look at Jess the way you do Sam. And you look at Sam the same way,” He shrugged again. “Well, the way I look at Ashley.” 

Beth eyes went wide. “Who was talking about Jess?”

“Oh please, Beth. We all see it.”

“Even-” She didn’t finish that thought. No. No! No more Jess. Not then. Maybe not ever again. “I wish I’d known. About Sam I mean.”

“Would you have done anything different if you did?”

“No.” The answer came to her far too easily, far too quickly. She wouldn’t. Maybe she still wouldn’t.

“Why?”

“Hannah.” In a weird way in the moment Beth understood Christopher Hartley better than she probably ever would anyone after. Because he knew Hannah and he knew Josh in a way Sam did not. In a way Sam wasn’t able too. In a way Beth only thought she could. But then Josh had been walking over him for almost ten years the same way he and Hannah did with her. Chris knew how ugly her family was. He’d been there before it was this bad. He was there when it started going bad. And he was there then, when it was bad and it could never go back. He knew.

Sam knew just enough. Just enough to love her. Just enough to be loved by her. The perfect amount. Everything was perfect about Sam and she’d missed it. So many days together she had missed out on how perfect she was. So many more she would miss how perfect she was. The girl who she thought was perfect for her belonged to Josh and the girl who was actually perfect for her belonged to Hannah. Beth Washington remained the runt of the litter.

After long drinks that had just become their norm by then Chris sighed before he said, “Your brother is a huge fucking asshole you know that?”

Even though a protective instinct pulsed through her she could only agree enthusiastically, “He is.”

The next one she didn’t expect. “And your sister is spoiled and immature as all hell.” 

The look he gave her. That statement wasn’t for him, but for her. So while that instinct to protect pulsed even harder she agreed with the same enthusiasm, “She really is.”

Chris looked over at her as he took his next long sip. His eyes never left her as she began to shake. Chris watched Beth stand and start pacing finishing his drink too fast. It seemed he was trying to make himself pass out. Beth could relate to that.

“They’re so selfish too. It’s like they don’t know there is a world outside of Josh and Hannah. And they just get everything. Everything they want and everyone they want. Poor baby Hannah and Josh who I have to look after all the time. When have those assholes ever done anything for me? When was the last time they thought about me? Other than ‘Beth, help me with my homework.’ ‘Beth, go order dinner for all of us.’ ‘Beth, we know you hate parties but you have to just deal cause what we want come first.’ ‘Beth, I’m so drunk right now. Please don’t let mom and dad find out.’ ‘Beth, Mike did this thing and that thing and blah blah.’ ‘Beth, me, me, me, me, me, ME!’”

“And fucking Jess and fucking Sam.” She downed a large amount of her beer, “Who do I get, huh? Josh gets Jess and Hannah gets Sam. So who is mine, Chris? You’re not mine! No one is mine! Who is there left to love me? Beth is just everybody’s second choice! Yours and Jess’ and Sam’s and Josh’s and Hannah’s and Mom’s and Dad’s back-up plan. What is mine, only mine? What is Beth’s? Who the fuck even is Beth? Without her stupid siblings? Does she even exist when nobody wants her? When nobody needs her? When she isn’t catering to Josh and Hannah?”

Chris stayed silent.

“Fuck them!” She threw the bottle at her window and they both cracked on impact, “I hate them, Chris! I hate them so fucking much!”

He smiled a tiny smile at her, “You don’t mean that.”

“No, but it feels really good to say.”

He passed her a beer she shouldn’t take. She’d had too many too fast already at that point. She grabbed the bottle anyway and popped the top off it. Chris held up his own bottle of beer for her to clink. “Huh. Maybe not such a good sister after all.”

They laughed as she knocked her bottle into his and collapsed back in her bed with him. Getting drunk with Chris off her cheap chick beer and an earned bitterness against Josh and Hannah and the bullshit that came with them was how Beth spent the reminder of her terrible night. She didn’t even feel bad so Chris was right about her not being such a good sister.

Or at least she wasn’t anymore.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Confession I do not have the next chapter done. Honestly I think what I need to keep going is some feedback from those of you reading it. If you would help me out that would be appreciated. Also two chapters at once. See how I spoil you all.


	9. Prison Break

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's time to bust out of this joint.

The lights were too bright. That was her main thought. The lights were too bright. They hurt her eyes. Her secondary thought was why was there a huge weight pinning her to her bed? She sat up as well as she could and looked down. Chris sans his glasses and drooling way too much was curled up against her long legs with his head on her tummy. His feet hung off the other side of her bed. She glanced at the clock and smiled a little. It was late mourning already. Josh and Hannah would wake or had woken up to find Beth did not get up early. She had not called their house cleaners. She had not chased any of the uninvited sleep-over guests out of the house. She had not ordered them all breakfast. She had done none of it. They might have knocked on her door or they might have been too helpless to even have thought to do so.

She smiled back down at Chris and she ruffled his hair like he was a dog. He fussed in his sleep like one too kicking out one of his feet. She pushed him off of her stomach and rolled him to the other side of her bed settling his head crookedly on one of her many pillows. He stirred a little but Chris could sleep through almost anything so he didn’t wake up. She wiped her shirt with the corner of her sheets (Seriously, Chris?) and then slipped under her covers.

She had a hang-over to sleep off.

\---

When she finally awoke properly she was alone and still tired. The sunlight was streaming in through her windows. The sun only shined on that side of the house right after noon. Beth flipped over to look at her clock. 2 o’ clock. She’d never slept in this late. She was an earlier riser. They used to joke about how Beth was the sun and Hannah was the moon. Josh would always ask ‘what am I, the Earth?’ ‘Yes, because you think everything revolves around you even though it doesn’t.’ It used to be funny up until Beth discovered she was Earth and it was Josh and Hannah combined making up the sun.

She sat up and soon realized what it was that had awoken her. It was yelling. Very loud yelling. It was coming from down the hall. Beth threw off her blankets and since she was still dressed from the night before rushed out into the hall. Hannah had done the same further up the hallway looking like she had also just woken up. It seemed they were both hoping no lingering party-goers had gotten into a fight.

“The hell is your issue?!”

“My issue is you spending the night with my little sister!”

“For fuck’s sake. I fell asleep in her room. We didn’t have sex!”

“So why were you trying to sneak out?”

“Cause I knew you’d get like this. Even though nothing happened and you know that.”

“See, I would believe you if you hadn’t made it blatantly clear that you want to fuck my sisters!”

“Oh and what’s this? Josh Washington can’t take a little bit of goading? Can only handle a dirty joke if he’s the one telling it?”

“Saying someone’s sister is a nice piece of ass is not a good joke.”

“You said the same thing about Jess. She’s my sister.”

“Please! You hate Jess! She screws people in her room all the time and you just put on your headphones to tune it out.”

“I don’t hate Jess. Maybe I’m just mature enough to accept she’s her own person. A person allowed to fuck whoever she wants and dance like a slut and have some goddamn fun!”

“Oh thanks! I almost forgot about you encouraging last night’s little strip tease featuring one of my baby sisters and then taking the other over to watch.”

“What’s your point?”

“That I don’t know what game you’re playing but I know you’re playing it and I have a guess at why!”

“God, how are you this stupid? Your sister is gay!”

“So? Man or not, you still have all the parts she likes, right?”

Hannah and Beth were not fast enough. Chris was a lot bigger than Josh which was why it took one hit to knock him down. He wasn’t done though. He dropped down to continue his assault. Josh retaliated and it became a confusing array of fists as both boys swung wildly at each other. Some punches landed and some didn’t but they just kept swinging. Chris had gotten Josh pinned down underneath him by the time Hannah and Beth made it over to them. Josh tried his best to block his face from Chris’ punches.

Hannah kept looking to Beth expectantly. Her eyes cried, ‘Do something! Stop them!’ Beth stayed still and no matter what Hannah did, she didn’t budge. She just stood there and watched her brother get an earned beating for the shit he’d been saying. Josh couldn’t get Chris off, he was too little to do much of anything to his larger friend. The best he could do was protect his face.

And Beth watched as Josh’s face grew more bruised and bloody.

Finally, probably summoning up everything she had to do so, Hannah rushed over and grabbed Chris’ shoulders from behind. She pulled gently but still hard enough to yank him off Josh. She was crying and shaking as she begged him, “Chris! Please stop! You’re hurting him. I don’t want you guys to fight. You’re scaring me!”

Chris leaned back to look at her which allowed Josh to shove him off. He landed a hit on his forehead and Chris fell down this time. Josh made a move to pin him to the floor this time but Hannah stepped in his way. She hugged him. Blood dripped from his face into her hair and onto her shoulders. Chris stood but made no move toward Josh. They stared each other down. Black, blue, red and purple blemishes were forming on their faces but since Chris had the advantage Josh had more and was bleeding worse. They were breathing very heavily. Josh had not hugged Hannah back but he also did not push her away.

“Josh-”

“Fuck off!” Josh yelled, not letting Chris finish, “I don’t know what made you such a huge douche all of a sudden but I don’t want to see your ugly ass face until you’re done being a fucking asshole.”

Chris looked like he wanted to argue but then turned around and stomped downstairs. Despite this he kept looking back the whole time as if hoping Josh didn’t really mean what he had said. As if hoping Josh would change his mind, would call him back and they could talk this all out. He stood at the bottom of the stairs for awhile too still looking up at them. He glanced over at Beth who wanted to say something but feared it would get them both in trouble. She gave him a sympathetic smile and a tiny shrug. Eventually he left.

Beth turned back to her siblings. Hannah was fussing over Josh’s wounds and crying. He leaned on her a little bit as he touched his face trying to locate the sources of his blood. Hannah was still hugging him to her when she turned Beth’s way. She stared at Beth waiting just like she had done earlier. She didn’t move her eyes no matter how long it had been. Finally she spoke.

“We need to help him. Clean him up and get some ice. He might even need to go see a doctor. We have to do something!”

She said we. She meant you.

“Yeah,” Beth agreed before she began to walk back to her room, “You two better get on that.”

\---

Josh did need to go to see a doctor and Hannah took him after banging on Beth’s door for 15 minutes leaving her alone in the house. It was quiet which was exactly what she needed.

Beth stared at the bedazzles on her phone as it sat face down on her bed. She, Sam, and Hannah had decorated their phones together. Then they took Chris and Josh’s and decorated them. Personally they thought Sam and Hannah’s pink bowed and heart-eyed, purple skull improved Josh’s phone case even if he didn’t. Beth had been far less mature but Chris actually laughed at her shiny, gold middle finger. In fact it was still the case he most liked to use for his phone. (Though that might have been because it was his charger case. Yet another gift from Mr. Riley.)

She reached for her phone and then pulled back. She did this a few times. That afternoon she’d had an excuse not to make any phone calls because her phone’s battery was drained. Plus she had to find it in the mess downstairs. She had almost been in a panic when she came back into her room and couldn’t find it. But it was night and her phone was fully charged. She had to find the strength to make this call. Although she sure as hell would not want to talk to anybody if she had been embarrassed in front of the closest person in her life.

Her heart burned. Not in the good way. Not like it did when she was with Sam.

She couldn't put it off indefinitely. She snatched up her phone and looked away quickly as she pressed the call button. The ring was too soft considering the tense air chocking her. Her chest turned to stone and she decided she shouldn’t have made the call. It was the worst thing to do. It was going to be hard for both parties. What was she thinking. She needed to hang up!

“Hello?” The voice on the other end said before she could. They sounded confused, which made sense.

“Hey, Ash.”

“What’s up?” They had been crying and made no attempt to hide it. They even sniffled twice.

Beth fiddled with her blanket. What was up? Why had she felt this overwhelming urge to call Ashley? They weren’t exactly ‘friend’ friends. Their closeness with Josh and Chris forced the two to at least try to enjoy each other’s company though and it worked moderately well. Still she was not close enough to Ashley to warrant a call like this. She took a very deep breath in then breathed out very audibly to say, “I’m sorry.”

“About?”

Beth said the only thing she could, “Chris.”

“What are you talking about?” Ashley sounded paranoid all of a sudden. Maybe a bit mad too. At who Beth was not sure. She had a feeling it might be at her though. Though it might have also been at Chris. Or really anyone. Again Beth didn’t really know Ashley. Whatever it was from it was not a good sign.

“I saw you and Chris last night outside of my window. I’m sorry he did that to you. No one deserves to feel used and unappreciated. No one deserves to have the person they love treat them… like that. And I feel really bad for you.”

Their tone snapped to anger, “Yeah, you’re right! People don’t deserve to be led on and left heartbroken and confused by someone who supposedly cares about them.”

Ashley knew. Of course they did. Ash apparently knew everything Sam didn’t want to tell anyone else. All the things Sam couldn’t say to Hannah or Beth. Most of which were her fault. “I just want to know if you’re alright? I really do. I was worried about you.”

Ashley sounded like they might fall apart. “Alright is not usually how someone feels after a break-up.”

“Ashley,” Beth tried hard not to gasp it. “That’s- why?”

“How are you even asking me that? You saw how he treated me last night! And right after-” They cut themselves off there, “You know what, my relationship is not your business!”

Beth involuntarily scoffed at that. The two of them had gone out of their way to make it her business. “Look, I know what Chris did was really shitty but he feels awful about it. He cried in my lap until he passed out last night. He’s so sorry.”

“You think I don’t know that? That he didn’t say that? I don’t care how bad he feels about it or that he got blackout drunk over it or how much he cried!”

“People mess up!” Beth felt her heart ache. They couldn’t break up. Chris and Ashley had to get through this! She couldn’t take it if they didn’t. Them not being together was not how things were meant to go. She wondered when that had cemented itself as a core belief in her mind. When had that become a universal truth. It didn’t matter, Chris and Ashley had to make it through this. They just did. "He loves you so much!"

“I wish I was surprised you’re taking his side on this but I’m not!” Ashley sounded ready for her blood after that, “I just told you this is not your business and I don’t need your permission to break-up with my boyfriend! And I know you didn’t call me because of Chris.”

Beth flinched at that and she knew why. She ignored it but it hang there in the back of her mind.

“Go take care of your own shit, Beth!” Ashley hung up. Beth stared at her phone in her hand. She shifted the screen over to her favorites list. Hannah, Josh, Sam and Chris. Sam and Chris were making goofy as fuck faces right next to each other on her screen. But which of them should she call? Ashley was probably right. Beth should get her own stuff in order before messing with other people’s problems. But she needed to do this before she could move forward.

He picked up on the very first ring sounding desperate, “Yeah?!”

She almost didn’t want to say anything and just hang up. “Hey, it’s Beth.”

“Oh, hey.” He sighed in disappointment. He’d picked up so fast he hadn’t even seen who’d called him and it was clear Beth had not been the person he’d hoped was on the other line. She wasn’t sure which of them he’d been waiting to call him but Beth almost wished in that moment she were Josh or Ashley. She felt that rock in her stomach again but three times heavier.

“How’s your face?”

“It hurts.”

“I’m really sorry.”

“For what?” He almost laughed, “You’ve been more than good to me this whole time. If anything I should say sorry to you.”

“You don’t have to.”

“Well, I am.” He said it quickly before he finished with a quiet, “So sorry.”

“Do you need anything?” She wondered if Jess or his mother was home. Had he driven himself back to his house when he was beaten up and probably hung over? She should go and see if he was okay. No. She shouldn’t and she wouldn't and really she couldn't.

“Beth, what are you doing?” He sounded tired and annoyed.

She was taken aback, “I’m checking up on you. This afternoon was- He didn’t have a right to say that stuff to you. You didn’t do anything-”

“Wrong?” he challenged, “No, I’d say I did a lot of things wrong. I’d say I did most things wrong actually.”

“You’re not a bad person, Chris.”

He didn’t respond to that. She wondered briefly if he had hung up but could still hear him breathing. They stayed on the phone for a long time, saying nothing. They just needed the company. Beth wasn’t sure what he was doing but it sounded like he was messing around with his tools. Chris always messed with his electronics and tried to improve or fix stuff when he was upset. He’d probably taken his entire computer apart after the shit show over the last 24 hours. Beth had started straightening out her room. She made her bed twice and reorganized her closet. Neither of them spoke, waiting for the other to do it. 

Finally he confessed, “Ashley dumped me.”

Beth didn’t want to sound like she already knew so she forced her voice into the softest tone she could when she said, “That’s- That really sucks, man.”

“It does, yeah.”

“Well maybe they just need to blow off some steam. I’m sure that once they’ve thought things through you guys will work it out.” She kind of hoped that was the case herself.

He did laugh quietly at that. “Anyone ever tell you that you suck at lying?”

“What?” Beth was taken aback even more by that. She was after all at her very core a liar.

“You suck at lying, Beth. We all know you like Jess. We all know you have a secret lock on your door. We all know you love to bake. And everyone saw something was going on between you and Sam over the last few weeks. Maybe they don’t all think it’s a crush or a relationship but they’ve talked about it. Emily and Jess thought you two went up to your room to have sex last night. That’s why Josh was so mad. According to Matt, all they talked about for an hour was about how you took off from the party to have sex. So he was already suspicious when he saw me leave your room. Though Sam was who most of them had put their money on. I mean I’m getting this second hand but I trust Matt so…” he probably shrugged after saying that. Beth was too distracted to care.

Was… was she really so delusional that she didn’t notice people didn’t buy her lies? If she was so bad at it then why did people never push her? The answer came to her quicker than she expected it to and was very painful. She couldn’t believe she hadn’t seen it. They all had simply chosen to believe her lies. Because… she was boring, invisible. Beth wasn’t a good liar. Beth was irrelevant.

“That’s why I’m sorry.” Oh no, had she spaced out? What was he talking about?

“I knew some of the guys thought something was going on between you and Sam and…” he paused for a short while, “I didn’t know how to tell you but I really wanted to. I didn’t know how to stop it either.”

She wanted to tell him it was okay but it wasn’t.

“I’m not brave. And I thought the only way I could get people to stop thinking you were seeing Sam was to admit that I was seeing Ashley, which I couldn’t do but it all- everything just kept getting worse. I couldn’t control anything.”

He sighed heavily, “Lying is hard.”

Beth smile sadly. “Telling the truth is also hard.”

\---

Beth’s room had never looked so spotless. She wasn’t normally an overly tidy person but she’d needed the distraction. Everything was so nicely put away. Her sheets were so straight and smooth they looked like a hard surface. She didn’t like that even a little. Beth found comfort in places that looked lived in. It reminded her of better times. Pillow fights, blanket forts and sleepovers with Sam, Chris, Josh and…

Beth grabbed the ends of her sheets roughly and yanked back far too hard. Hard enough that all of her pillows flew off and scattered around her room. They knocked into the dresser, the desk and one even hit the crack on the window. The crack almost looked like a sloppy ‘H.’ She wasn’t sure if she wanted that to just be in her own mind or not. Though it didn’t really matter much if it was. She still existed. She had always existed and given Beth no peace in her life. Her mother once told her she almost never cried on her own as a baby but she always cried when Hannah did. But never the other way around.

In a fit she crumpled her sheets back up and tossed them onto her bed in a giant mess. She yanked one side to straighten it slightly. It was still messy but no longer stuffed into a ball. Once done with that she went to grab her pillows and tossed them hard at her bed. The first two hit the headboard and the third landed at the foot of her bed, the fourth one skid over the middle of it and almost fell to the floor off the other side. She wondered if she should grab a few clothes from her closet and toss them on too. She did kick her soccer ball over when she passed it. It bounced off one of the legs and gently hit the bottom of her full length mirror. Once by the window she picked up the last pillow. She stared at that stupid crack and thought of Hannah. She blindly threw her pillow back behind her at the bed, her eyes closed tightly to stop the tears.

“Oof.’ She heard from the door and turned around to see Hannah in the doorway with Beth’s pillow at her feet. She must have hit her. Beth did not know she and Josh had gotten home. Hannah put a hand to her cheek as if it could have possibly hurt that much. She cautiously walked into Beth's room as if scared her sister was going to strike her. Beth suppressed the urge to roll her eyes. Once it became clear that Beth wasn’t going to harm her, Hannah’s face scrunched up in anger. She crossed her arms.

Even so it was Beth who was first to speak. "What do you want?"

Hannah huffed at her. "Josh is fine! He's in bed knocked out from his pain meds but he'll be okay. Nice of you to ask!" 

Beth shrugged. "I didn't."

“What the hell is your problem?” Hannah was quick to abandon pleasantry. 

“My problem? What is your problem?” Beth wasn’t really being all that fair. That was exactly the question she would have asked Hannah in this circumstance too. She didn’t care though. That didn’t matter.

“My problem is whatever the hell you and Sam have been doing behind my back for the last month!” Hannah snapped.

“What? Hanging out?” Beth snapped back, “Sam and I are also friends. You even said so! Remember? ”

“Cut the crap Beth! I know something is going on. I’m not stupid!”

“No, you’re just an entitled brat who can’t handle anything! I don’t owe you anything, Hannah! I can spend time with whoever I want to and guess what right now I want to hang out with Sam.”

“You can’t keep her all to yourself! She was my friend first. I want to hang out with her too!”

Beth was so mad. So very, very mad. That was apparently a very bad thing. “Well clearly she doesn’t want to hang out with you now does she? If she did we wouldn't be fighting about it!”

Beth saw tears in her older sister’s eyes. Hannah faltered a bit when she spoke again. “That’s not true. Sam wants to hang out with me. You’ve just been hogging all her attention!”

“Yeah? That’s why she asked you to teach her to play tennis, right? That's why she took you out to the sushi place for dinner and down to the docks for a boat ride?” Beth felt herself smirk widely, “Oh wait-”

“Shut up!” Hannah almost shrieked. “Sam is my friend! Mine! She’s my best friend!”

“She’s doing a pretty shitty job of showing it then, isn’t she? She ran out on you last night, didn’t she?”

“No! She ran out on you!”

“Really? Cause she didn’t leave until you showed up!”

Hannah’s face fell. Clearly she had not thought of that. Beth knew Hannah wasn’t the reason Sam ran off the night before. At least not entirely. No! No, it was Hannah’s fault. Sam had kissed Beth! It was not until her sister showed up that the two girls had separated. That Sam had gotten upset. Hannah was the reason Sam had left. Well, Beth was not letting Hannah stand in their way anymore! Sam wanted her and she wanted Sam and Hannah would just have to fucking deal!

“You’re wrong!” Hannah actually stomped her foot like a child.

"Am I?!"

“I’ll prove it. I’ll call her right now!”

“Go ahead. Do it!” Beth had no idea where this surge of confidence that Hannah was Sam’s problem not her came from. But Hannah was the problem. Beth knew this was all Hannah’s fault!

Hannah pulled out her phone and put it on speaker after she dialed Sam. The two girls listened to it ring and Beth felt no fear and no anxiety. She knew she was right. Beth was always right! It rang for some time and no one picked up. Soon they heard Sam’s voicemail. Hannah didn’t even let it finish before she hung up. She gave her sister a look trying to hide her disappointment. She steeled her nerves and redialed. Beth had to admit it was possible Sam just didn’t hear her phone ring so Hannah was not being irrational. Once more they waited until Sam’s voicemail filled the room. Hannah looked like she was going to cry and scream at the same time. She made a small noise Beth couldn’t decipher the meaning of as she dialed the phone one last time. This time it was a silly thing to do. Still the only answer was Sam’s prerecorded message.

“This doesn’t prove anything!” Hannah did scream that. “She’s just busy.”

Beth would never understand what she did next and why she did it. She dug her own phone from out of her covers and held it out where Hannah could see. She pressed the contact button for Sam, flipped on the speaker phone and listened as the phone began to ring. They stared each other down. It rang once. It rang twice.

“Hello?”


	10. Broken Shackles

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It was all just dead weight anyway.

Hannah had run from the room crying because of course she was not brave enough to confront Sam on this (or really any) issue. With her suspicions confirmed she had no one to turn to as Beth and Sam were the root cause of her new found pain. She had been burned by her most trusted confidants. She had nowhere to turn. Served her right for busting into Beth’s room and acting like her sister owed her some explanation for her relationship with Sam. Whatever that was.

Speaking of Beth fumbled with the phone in her hand. She had called Sam. She was just standing there with her on the other line, waiting. She had left her on the line for too long already, she had to talk to her. She didn’t have a choice at that point. Beth had not planned this far ahead.

“Uh Beth?” the voice on the other line asked cautiously. “Are you there?”

Beth quickly took her phone off speaker and brought it to her ear, trying not to drop it in the process. She took one deep breath then answered, “Yeah, I’m here.”

There was silence. Beth checked her phone. They were still connected. If she listened closely she actually thought she heard talking in the background. Finally she heard what might have been Sam sighing and taking a deep breath before she said, “So hey.”

“Hey,” Beth answered in the same nervous tone.

More silence then more whispering on Sam’s end before she spoke again, “Look, about last night-”

“Sam,” Beth interrupted before she lost her nerve. Hell before either of them had the chance to lose their nerves, “Before you say anything I want you to know…”

Beth took another breath then forced herself to say, “That kissing you was amazing.”

After she said it she felt like she couldn’t breathe right. Had that sounded stupid? It had probably sounded stupid. Could she take it back? No, no she wasn’t taking it back. Somehow it almost felt like someone else said it and it just came out of Beth’s mouth. Someone much braver who went for the things they wanted. Someone who wasn’t afraid to take a leap of faith and see where the chips fell. Someone who didn’t survive but lived.

It felt great.

“Yeah?” Sam answered shyly, sounding completely caught off guard. It brought Beth into the moment. A moment she never wanted to leave. A moment full of possibilities.

Before Beth could respond, there was a voice on Sam’s end again saying something in a bit of a hurry to which Sam replied, “Shh, give me a second.”

“Sam?”

“Oh. Yeah, I’m here.” Sam’s voice was back to its normal volume so she was talking to Beth again. “Is that why you called? To talk about our kiss last night?”

“Mostly, yeah.” She couldn’t admit to Sam that she had her called to mess with her twin because they were fighting. She was planning to call Sam anyway. That just happened to be the thing that got her to call. This had very little to do with Hannah and everything to do with them.

Beth went a little weak at the knees and had to sit down. She and Sam might be a them.

“Well, it’s nice to hear I didn’t like gross you out.” Sam sounded so shy and her voice was so small. It was hard to believe this meek thing had kissed her with full power and passion not more than twenty-four hours ago. She had though. Sam had kissed her and Beth refused to feel anything but elation over that. She didn’t care how sucky things were for everybody else. She deserved to enjoy this. It was the very least she was owed after everything she put up with.

“I don’t think I have to bother telling you I liked it too,” Sam said after a few moments. The voice whispered something again and Sam whispered back only this time Beth didn’t catch what she said. Beth had a guess who Sam was with and she realized with a slight pang of hurt that might have had something to do with her not picking up when Hannah called. Had Sam been alone she may have answered. She had still answered for Beth though. That still meant something.

“Maybe you should, I almost got the wrong impression from you running off like that.” Beth wanted her attention back. She tried to say it in a joking tone but her nervousness clearly came through. She found herself playing with the edge of the sheets messily piled around her as she waited for the other girl to respond. The air almost choked her as she did.

“Sorry about that,” Sam sighed, sounding embarrassed, “I was just so drunk last night and I couldn’t believe I did that in front of Hannah. I still can’t believe I did it!”

A stab of jealousy went through Beth but she ignored it.

Another deep sigh. “I don’t even know what I’m gonna say to her. That was not how wanted to come out to my best friend. No offense.”

Hannah doesn’t know. The words came to Beth’s mind but she stayed quiet.

“I don’t think I can even face her right now.”

Hannah doesn’t know. They settled in the back of her throat.

“She’s probably so upset with me, right? No, don’t tell me. No, do. No, no, don’t.”

Hannah doesn’t know. It was like each letter was hitting against Beth’s teeth as the words tried to get out.

“Anyway, I don’t want to talk about Hannah.” Sam forced her voice into a sweet tone as she continued, “I’d rather focus on what this all means for us.”

Hannah doesn’t know. It died as she swallowed it back down.

“Me too.”

Yet they both fell silent afterward. Beth felt the smile on her face and how big it was. Hopefully Sam smiling was the reason she was being quiet as well. It was a nice place to be. This “right before it all starts” place, the “where are we going” place, a “my heart is light and every word you say only makes it float higher” place. Before she could say anything else though she heard a phone ringing… through her phone. It was cut off in less than half a second and she heard the mystery voice loud and clear this time.

“Stop calling me!”

Whatever Beth was going to say disappeared in a strange flood of guilt. She and he were having very different conversations with people they had very similar feelings for. There was something unsettling about knowing that.

Sam sighed as if she no longer knew what she had wanted to say either. She sounded apologetic as she said, “I’m sorry, Beth. I want to talk it’s just- I don’t know if you know-”

“I know.” She was trying not to think about it but she knew. It was work but she’d pushed it from her mind.

“Oh. Ashley really needs me right now. Chris did something pretty messed up last night and it’s not like they can talk to anyone else about it.”

Ashley just spent the whole fucking night and day with you, how much “crying over my shitty boyfriend” time could they need?! Beth was angry until her mind corrected itself. Ex-boyfriend.

“No, you should be with them. They need a friend.”

There was more silence as if neither wanted to be the one to end the conversation or they were both too shy to. Then as if she was just remembering something Sam added, “But we can talk tomorrow if you want to. In person, maybe.”

“Definitely! Your place or-” Beth cleared her throat, “Do you want me to come over to your place?”

“Oh, actually, I uh,” Sam fumbled with her words a bit and Beth has never been made so nervous by someone stumbling over their words, “I actually think it would be better if we met up somewhere to hang out and talk.”

Beth’s heart almost stopped, “You mean like a date?”

The silence stretched between them though faintly in the background Beth could hear Ashley crying. They really needed Sam but Beth didn’t care as much as she should about that at the moment. She didn’t care that Ashley’s need for Sam must be putting her on the spot. She was done playing second fiddle, of being someone’s understudy. Here and now, Beth came first.

“Do you want it to be a date?” was what Sam said.

Feeling the sides of her mouth tug up, Beth sighed, “I do, yeah.”

“Then it’s a date.”

A smile overtook Beth’s face after she said that. She heard herself giggling a little and was embarrassed until she heard Sam was giggling a little too. Her face was hot and her head was light and airy. This really was something great. Beth was going on a date. She hadn’t been on a date in a long time. Unless the other times they had hung out in the last few weeks retroactively counted as dates, which meant she’d been on a lot of great dates with Sam and was excited for another.

“Okay, I have to go cause, you know.” Sam’s was quiet as if Ashley couldn’t hear her when they most likely could.

“Yeah, I know.”

“But I’ll text you later and we’ll meet up tomorrow.”

“Sounds great.”

“Okay.”

“Alright.”

“Well, bye.

“Bye.”

It was like they didn’t want to hang up and as cheesy as that was Beth was so happy about being so stupidly infatuated with Sam. Finally she heard Ashley’s ringtone again followed by them almost shrieking, “Just leave me alone!” then more crying. Sam didn’t say anything, she just hung up to tend to a heartbroken Ashley. That put a damper on the conversation but it didn’t come anywhere near close to ruining it for her. So with a happy sigh Beth fell into bed.

Beth had a date tomorrow! Her first real official date with Sam. She couldn’t believe how excited she was. It was like she had been dying for this day to come. Somehow even though she didn’t really understand her feelings for Sam until the night before it felt like she had been looking forward to this forever. She wasn’t even sure what to do with the rest of her night. She wondered if she should start planning for the day, maybe pick out her outfit. She had to shower but should she doll up? Maybe perfume or something. That wasn’t usually her thing but it was sort of a special occasion.

Well she’d figure that out in the morning. She was going to shower now, that would tire her out and she could sleep. She rolled up to a sitting position and decided to plug her phone back in. It was nowhere near close to dying but she wanted to be sure she didn’t miss any messages from Sam.

She stared down at once it was sat on her nightstand. She ignored her thoughts though as she gathered what she needed for a shower. Towel, washcloths, some night clothes. The whole time however she glanced back at her phone. She even paused at her door to look at it as she was leaving.

She looked across the hall at her sister’s door, shut and most likely locked. Even if she wanted to talk to Hannah she doubted Hannah wanted to talk to her. It wasn’t her fault that Sam didn’t want to see or talk to her. Their friendship was their business, not hers. She had no obligation to help. She didn’t have to tell Hannah anything she didn’t want to and she didn’t want to tell Hannah that Sam thought she had outed herself. If Sam didn’t want to see Hannah then that was not on Beth.

Beth’s last thought on it as she closed her own door and head for their shared bathroom was that Hannah needed to learn to do things for herself.

\---

Josh looked terrible the next morning.

Beth isn’t sure what she expected her brother to look like but what he did look like was total garbage. He was drinking something from a can at eight am. (Beth had woken up early in her excitement.) She was surprised he was even awake before noon let alone out of bed before ten. He was sitting on the counter and looked a little dazed. He was probably high.

“What woke you up?” she asked pulling a calmetine out of the fridge. She wasn’t going to be able to stomach much that day but she had to eat. She was meeting Sam at the park over by her place later in the morning and her stomach was packed with anxiety. What they were going to do once they were there she had no idea. All she cared about was getting to see Sam.

“I slept like shit cause of my fucked up face,” Josh explained, slamming his can down. Beth saw now is was cola. She rolled her eyes. “The sun woke me up and I couldn’t get back down.”

“So you’re drinking soda?” she asked as he popped open another can and began to guzzle it down. He paused to toss a handful of plain tortilla chips into his mouth then started drowning himself in sugar again.

“Yeah,” he answered when he pulled it away from his mouth, a slight rasp in his voice, “I’m hoping to get a sugar high, crash and be able to sleep this afternoon.”

“Brilliant plan,” she said hopping up next to him on the counter. She peeled the skin of her fruit and popped one slice into her mouth as her brother finished what looked like his third can of cola. Amazingly he opened another one after that too. He paused for two more handfuls of chips and then was back to downing his soda. Jesus, Josh was gross!

She looked him over and felt like telling him to stop eating junk food and get into bed. She found herself wondering what medicines they had in their bathrooms and if any would be good for pain or sleep. They must have given him something at the hospital. She should see how many he had taken so far and make sure he wasn’t taking more than he should be. Did they have any soft food he could eat? There was probably soup. If not mac and cheese or applesauce. That would be simple enough for her to make before she left. If he wanted soda he should be drinking something more like ginger ale. The store was near enough, she could grab it and some crackers or-

Beth stopped herself from thinking anymore. No. No. Josh could take care of himself and if he couldn’t too bad! He was almost eighteen. That’s a legal adult. If Josh had no idea how to take care of himself at this age then he deserved to suffer. He deserved to be in pain if he wasn’t even trying to treat himself well. If Josh wanted to feel awful all day by drinking sugar and eating salt then he could and she didn’t care. Let Hannah have to deal with him when he was stuck on the toilet in three hours. Beth had plans!

Once she’d mostly finished her fruit she dared to ask, “So have you heard from Chris?”

The glare Josh gave her informed her that whether he had or hadn’t he was not happy about it. She looked away and went back to finishing her light breakfast. Things were quiet after that. She watched Josh as he took out his phone. He was looking through it but she had no idea what for. Maybe he was hoping Chris had called and he hadn’t or maybe Chris, like he’d been doing with Ashley the night before, hadn’t stopped calling and messaging Josh, who was looking over what was said between them. Soon though she saw Josh was holding his phone up to examine his face either in the reflection or with the camera and he looked even more upset. Scowling with his injured face made him look much worse than he already did. Looking at him she can't say she would be eager to forgive Chris either were their places switched. Taking time apart had probably been the right call on his part

Suddenly she felt her throat constrict and a question that had been staining her heart for weeks came to the front of her mind. Should she tell Josh? About Chris and Ashley?

Beth had decided she wasn’t taking anything from anyone anymore. As bad as she felt for him that included Chris. She shouldn't be making herself feel guilty by keeping her mouth shut on his behalf. She had been torturing herself over this for weeks! He even admit that when push came to shove he hadn't had the balls to defend her against the rumors about her and Sam. What had Chris done to earn this kind of loyalty? Nothing! Nothing but add complications to her life so he could fuck Ashley!

Josh had a right to know! She had always felt that way. She had always believed that. What was stopping her now from telling him? If Chris wasn’t going to then she should. She wasn't going to be his little secret keeper anymore. She wasn't going to let him or anyone else control her anymore. She shouldn’t even feel bad over it. Chris and Ashley weren’t together anymore. The secret was meaningless. What was the point of keeping it to herself now? Eventually Josh was going to see his friends had had a falling out of some kind and they would have to admit what they did to him. She might as well get it off her own chest.

However Beth found instead herself turning away from Josh, saying nothing. Because you know what? She didn’t owe Josh anything either! All she had ever done was look out for the two of them. He needed to grow up. If he was too ignorant to see his two best friends had been fooling around over the last month that was his issue. She didn’t care if he knew and she didn’t care if he ever found out. She didn’t care if Josh went to his grave hating them and her and Sam. That was a Josh problem, not a Beth problem. He’s the one who picked such shitty friends.

She was surprised how easy it was to hop off the counter and head out of the room with nothing more than a, “Alright, bro, feel better.”

Josh grunted something back. It may have been words but Beth didn’t care. She was in no one’s debt.

\---

Hannah was either being lazy that day or she was still upset and hiding out in her room because Beth didn't see her the entire morning. She never joined her and Josh in the kitchen for “breakfast.” They didn't run into each other in the bathroom while Beth was getting ready to go out. There wasn't even any noise coming from her room. Beth saw no trace or evidence of her sister for hours. Maybe she wasn't home but she didn't care enough to check with their friends.

Josh dragged himself back to bed less than an hour after they talked. He’d taken pretty much every unhealthy food they had with him. He turned on some very loud music and locked the door. Whatever he was doing in there, he did not want to be disturbed while doing it. She felt the urge to check up on him once but when she found his door locked she shrugged it off to continue on with her day.

It was a nice, calm morning. She couldn't remember the last time things had been so relaxed at home. She even managed to make tea and dug out some biscuits she and Sam had made a few days ago (while Hannah was nearby on her phone). It reminded her of where she was going that day and why and her heartbeat quickened more than she wanted to admit id did. Nothing was going to bring her down. Nothing could bring her down. It was going to be a good day.

She knew she was going to be early when she left but she was too excited to wait any longer than she had. She found their family car was in the driveway so Hannah must still be home. Beth gave it no more thought than that though. Even if she wanted to do something about it she couldn't. She had important plans.

She was ready to start up the car and head out when her phone rang. She had a brief moment of panic where she wondered of Sam was calling to cancel. That she was calling to say she talked to Hannah and was upset that Beth had lied to them both. Though Beth had not lied. She just hadn't said anything about it. She asked her to stay out of it the night before so she had no right to be mad. Beth had done nothing wrong. Sam had to understand that.

It wasn't Sam though. It was Chris.

Beth didn't answer. Instead she sat in the driver's seat and watched the phone continue to ring in her hand. She stared at Chris’ name and the goofy picture she had of him on her phone as her contact photo. She waited for all six rings before her voicemail finally picked up. Even after she stared at it for longer than necessary. She had no idea why he would have called her. Well she had a few ideas but she didn't want to talk about him and Josh or about him and Ashley. She had given him a lot and really if the well was dry for anyone if was Chris. He had made his bed alone and she did not have to sleep in it with him. No one had to deal with this but Chris. That included her.

Beth went to turn on the car when she noticed she had a voicemail. It was from him and she knew it. Still she paused again, hit the voicemail button and listened.

“Hey Beth, it's- uh it's Chris. Look I know things have been shitty lately and I’ve been a bit of a wreck but I never got to talk to you about Sam and that whole thing. I'm not sure what happened with you guys but I hope whatever is going on with you two is good. Sam likes you a lot. I know cause Ash- Just I know that she likes you a lot. And I wanted you to know that uh if you ever need anyone to hide your relationship give me a call.” He laughed to himself weakly then said, “Yeah that- that wasn't funny. Anyway just let me know how things work out.” There was another awkward moment of silence before he hung up.

Beth was back to staring at her phone. She stayed there for what felt like a full minute. She really thought about calling him back. Chris was trying so hard to make things right with her. Underneath all the bullshit he was causing Chris was a good guy. He hadn't wanted to hurt anybody. Not Josh or Ashley or her. He had just been excited the way Beth was now. He was a just a guy with a crush. No different than her.

But Chris had hurt people. He had hurt of lot of people directly or indirectly. Chris was a good guy but Ashley was right. Chris didn't deserve to be forgiven so easily. If the road to hell was paved with good intentions, Chris was the guy who drew up the blueprints. No matter how good you are there are some wounds that can't be so simply healed and Chris had made a lot of those.

Still it was sweet of him to ask. So with a small sigh she texted him back, “Thanks. I’ll keep you updated.” Then she tossed her phone onto the passenger's seat and finally made her way out of the driveway.

Beth had a date!

**Author's Note:**

> Yeah so Josh is forcing the Chrashley thing interpretation but for not "I love him/her" reasons
> 
> Edit: In case you missed the tag, this story takes place in my step-sibling AU’s canon. Partially because I love that AU but also this plot works really well within it.
> 
> All feedback is welcome and appreciated


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